In a new public service spot out of Unalaska, fourth graders from Eagle’s View Elementary School sing and dance to the tune of rapper M.I.A’s “Paper Planes.” Unlike M.I.A., whose lyrics are about immigrant stereotypes, drugs and violence, the fourth graders are recruiting for a community cleanup.
We see plastic bags and Comet with bleach/
Trash around town can be such a drag/
So we walk through with this yellow bag.”
The iconic gun shots and ka-chings in the original song’s chorus are replaced with well-punctuated sounds of industrial strength garbage bags being whipped open. The onomatopoeia is rounded out with trash being crushed and dunked into bags.
Chrissy Roes of KUCB’s Channel 8 worked closely with fourth grade teacher Mary Heimes to create the music video PSA.
The Unalaska Community Center organizes two weeks of intensive spring cleanup each year to deal with a winter’s worth of stormy weather that dumps trash on the beaches and along the roads.
This year’s cleanup runs from May 1 through May 15. As part of the cleanup, the center has even stashed 12 prize tickets around town that can be redeemed for a prize.
KUCB’s Lauren Adams contributed to this report.
Jeremy Hsieh is the deputy managing editor of the KTOO newsroom in Juneau. He’s a podcast fiend who’s worked in journalism since high school as a reporter, editor and television producer. He ran Gavel Alaska for 360 North from 2011 to 2016, and is big on experimenting with novel tools and mediums (including the occasional animated gif) to tell stories and demystify the news. Jeremy’s an East Coast transplant who moved to Juneau in 2008.
