Sort Smart: AI Tray Scanner
An AI cafeteria tray scanner that ends the guesswork and stops contamination at the source.
Highlights
- Live computer-vision scan at the point of disposal
- Recognizes common cafeteria items in real time
- Sorts into recycling, compost, or trash with no guesswork
- Directly cuts the contamination that undermines recycling
What's next
- Expand the tray-image training dataset for higher accuracy
- Pilot Sort Smart in a Pike County cafeteria
- Pair a scanner with every bin station
Bins alone aren't enough
Stand in any school cafeteria at lunch and you'll see the same scene: a student pauses at the bins, shrugs, and guesses. It's not carelessness; it happens in cafeterias everywhere, every single day.
Guesswork
Does this bottle go in mixed recycling? Does the cap go in too? Faced with a split-second choice, most students guess.
Contamination
One misplaced item can compromise an entire bin of otherwise recyclable material.
Trash
When in doubt, everything ends up in one bin, and the whole batch is lost to the landfill.
The solution we're building
Sorting mistakes are normal, so instead of leaving students to guess, we're building the answer into the lunch line. Sort Smart pairs an AI sorting model with a live camera feed that recognizes what's on each tray and shows students where every item goes, sorting and teaching at the same time, one lunch at a time.
From tray to sorted in seconds
A camera feed watches the tray, the model identifies each item, and the student learns the right bin on the spot.
Scan the tray
A student holds their finished lunch tray up to the scanner.
Identify the items
The AI recognizes common cafeteria items like bottles, cartons, scraps, and packaging.
Sort with confidence
It tells the student whether each item belongs in recycling, compost, or trash.
Learn & improve
Less contamination, faster lines, and a little lesson with every lunch.
Recycling & Composting
Student-built recycling and composting, now running across six Pike County high schools.
Bottle to Filament
Turning recycled bottles into 3D-printing filament, made right here in the community.
Tray Policy
Amending state policy to get styrofoam out of school cafeterias and fund the switch.