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Success Stories - College / University
Success Stories
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Eastern Illinois University (EIU) – Charleston, Ill
Since becoming a WasteWise Partner in 1997, EIU has successfully implemented its comprehensive waste reduction program. In 2005, with the voluntary efforts of more than 13,500 students, faculty, and staff, EIU diverted nearly 50 percent of its waste through recycling efforts, boosting its waste reduction and recycling cost savings to $140,000. EIU supports the university community through the reuse of furniture and office supplies. It also has a creative reuse program with its township—the school donated 615 tons of boiler ash to road supervisors in 2005 to provide better traction on snow- and ice-covered roads.
EIU, a state university of 9,350 students, not only looks for common items to reduce, reuse, and recycle, but uncommon items as well. Turning waste into an asset, Eastern composted more than 12 tons of leaves and brush collected on campus in 2000 and used it in landscaping on the cam-pus. The grounds department also sold firewood from tree limbs cleared on campus, netting $1,190, and chipped wood to use as mulch. To prevent the disposal of reusable VHS tapes, Eastern collected tapes from the athletic department and redistributed them to the campus television station, where they were reused for broadcasting. Since 1999, the university has recycled mattresses by inserting language into its procurement contract requiring that mattresses be recycled, saving fuel, labor, and landfill space.
EIU had the right idea when it avoided more than $26,000 in disposal costs by donating toilets and washing machines to Habitat for Humanity, but the reuse activities didn’t stop with household appliances. Instead of sending them to landfills, Eastern Illinois distributed nearly 400 tons of coal ash from the school’s power generator to various government agencies to spread on roads for added traction in winter conditions. Other donations include giving used textbooks to third world countries to replace reading material decades out of date.
EIU also achieved an impressive recycling rate in 2001—56 percent of its total waste! Collection of paper seems to be the school’s specialty—374 tons of paper products were recycled in 2001. Allan Rathe, the school’s recycling coordinator, captured the administration’s sentiments on paper collection when he said, “We are greedy in the Recycling Department; we want all of Eastern’s paperwork to come to us!” As for recycling other materials, Eastern Illinois collected nearly 140 tons of steel and nearly 83 tons of wood, along with impressive amounts of plastic, aluminum, and yard trimmings.
The school also does its part in creating demand in the recycling market by purchasing $194,000 worth of products containing recycled materials. These recycled-content products made up 36 percent of the university’s purchases in 2001.
EIU is committed to saving natural resources through the volunteer efforts of the university’s 2,000 faculty and staff and 10,790 campus residents. The university also hires young adults with learning disabilities to help with its environmental program. The university composted 94.5 tons of yard trimmings onsite and used it to mulch flower beds and around trees, reduced the amount of computer paper used on campus by 10 percent, and reused 13 tons of office supplies through an internal exchange among employees.
Emory University – Atlanta, GA
Emory University makes waste reduction a university priority by emphasizing recycled-content purchasing, as well as reuse and recycling. From 1999 to 2000, the university doubled its spending on recycled-content products to $1.2 million. To accomplish this, the recycling office, Emory Recycles, added a procurement link to its Web site, and the purchasing department established a requirement that all letterhead would be made of postconsumer-content paper, based on EPA standards. Emory provided all entering freshmen with reusable mugs and educated the campus community about waste reduction by providing tours of the recycling facility to freshmen orientation classes, departments, and neighboring schools. In the area of recycling, Emory Recycles’ staff made it easy to recycle ink jet cartridges on campus by distributing cartridge recycling envelopes to residence halls, administrative offices, and classrooms, collecting 183 cartridges in the first year of the program. Emory’s waste reduction policy affects the larger community as well. The university held an “Everything Drive” at which students donated food, clothing, and furniture to local reuse organizations, and students found fun ways of sharing the waste reduction message with local children through an Earth Day fair.
To promote the importance of “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle,” Emory University partnered with Rollins Environmental Health Action Committee to buy and distribute 250 reusable mugs across its Atlanta campus. To get students to use these mugs, the local Starbucks gave a 50 percent discount on any beverage. This mug and coffee deal pushed Emory students into a reuse mindset.
The school then sponsored an “Everything Drive” during move-out days, through which students donated their extras to be reused by people in need. The Surplus Shop on campus sells used office furniture and supplies at greatly reduced prices, saving employees nearly $40,000 on equipment.
In 2001, Emory expanded its toner cartridge collection program to most academic and administrative offices, recycling a total of 1,300 pounds of plastic cartridges. It also collected an impressive 400 tons of paper products. More than 75 tons of metal cans and nearly 57 tons of glass were also recycled. The school also established a community recycling drop-off site that is so popular, it requires collection three to four times every week.
Emory supports recycling markets by purchasing items containing recycled materials, such as 100 percent recycled toilet paper and hand towels. In fact, 42 percent of the products the university bought in 2001 contained postconsumer content, totaling $1.35 million spent on recycled-content materials.
Jackson State University (JSU) – Jackson, Mississippi
JSU created the Computer Recycling and Training Project to increase awareness about computer recycling and create jobs for the local economy. This program provides onsite job training for low-income individuals, teaching them valuable skills needed for employment. Using newspapers to advertise, the program collected more than 16,000 pounds of computers and computer components from area colleges and universities, businesses, private homes, and state and local agencies. Volunteers and participants in the job training program then refurbished the computers for redistribution in the community and sent computers that could not be refurbished to a recycler in Louisiana. In 2003, program participants refurbished and donated 70 computers.
Medical University of South Carolina – Charleston, SC
The Medical University of South Carolina conserves natural resources with a cost-effective recycling and donation program, an impressive vermicomposting program, and extensive C&D recycling projects. The hospital donates unused items to local schools and charities, reducing disposal costs and helping the community. Internally, its four-year-old worm farm, “fed” by the university’s cafeteria, transforms organic waste into nutrient-rich fertilizer. To top off its first year activities, the university conscientiously deconstructed two quadrangle buildings, sending the concrete, steel, and bricks to local vendors for recycling and saving approximately 8,529 BTUs of energy—enough energy to power more than 80 homes for an entire year!
Miami University – OH
With a student body of more than 16,000, Miami University integrates fun into waste reduction, getting students involved through competition. In one initiative, “Waging War on Waste,” Miami University pitted its students against food waste and trash in the hope that waste would be the ultimate loser. The program started with food waste, but expanded to “to go” waste in 2003 after an informal waste audit identified a need for reusable trays instead of nonrecyclable “to go” packaging. Miami University is also a founding member of Recycle Mania—a highly lauded intercollegiate recycling competition that now includes 17 schools—and has been a formidable challenger since 2001. For 10 weeks every year, the university competes against other colleges to see which school can collect the most recyclables. In addition to traditional materials, Miami students recycled more than 14,800 pounds of hardcover books and 31,600 pounds of computer equipment in 2003. By significantly reducing the total quantity of materials landfilled in 2003, the university saved an impressive $66,500 in avoided disposal fees.
Ohio University – OH
When Ohio University students move into their dorms, they not only receive their room keys, they also get an array of recycling information—from outdoor recycling areas to displays and information in the buildings and even in their rooms. Some of this visibility is assisted by Wastebusters, which are recycling liaisons between students and Campus Recycling and Energy Conservation Departments. This corps of Wastebusters is made up of students and residence life staff.
In 2001, Ohio University Facilities Management continued to upgrade its buildings for the smoothest and most efficient recycling collection possible. It obtained lightweight recycling barrels for outdoor events where recycling collection is often difficult. The university collected an impressive 1,200 tons of paper products for recycling in 2001, plus 304 tons of metals, and a huge amount of glass, yard trimmings, wood, textiles, and a wide array of other materials. The school also collects reusable items to be redistributed, including art supplies and art work, clothing and linens, and terrariums and aquariums. These collections enabled Ohio University Facilities Management to recycle nearly 50 percent of its overall waste in 2001.
To promote reuse, the school is generous with donations. The university gave extra beds, chairs, and desks to social agencies, schools, and organizations in 2001, avoiding $2,000 in disposal costs. Plans for next year include working with the school’s office supply vendor to increase recycled content in Ohio University’s office products. Ohio University Facilities Management is also working to meet its impressive goal of recycling 80 percent of the waste generated by its students, faculty, and staff.
Seattle University – Seattle, WA
Seattle University attributes its success at waste reduction to creativity, commitment to excellence, and community support. Seattle sent more than 46 tons of food scraps to an off-site composting facility in 2000, and recently approved plans to begin on-site composting of food and yard waste. Additionally, its new student center will meet the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) criteria for green buildings. Campus education plays a vital role in the university’s success; the Environmental Services Office publishes a quarterly newsletter, Resource, that highlights special events, waste reduction, and sustainability; and this April, the office held a fashion show and street fair in celebration of Earth Day. Seattle students and staff donated nearly 5 tons of clothing to local organizations in 2000 through their move-out clothing drive and year-round clothing donation sites.
Seattle University has made a firm commitment to waste reduction. Through its innovative surplus store, for example, the university sold 71 tons of surplus furniture such as tables, blackboards, computer equipment, and desks to community members, saving nearly $24,000 in 1999 disposal costs alone. All sales revenue supports the university’s recycling program. The university also collected more than 1 ton of clothes from students in a campus clothing drive to benefit a local charity for homeless youth.
In April 2001, Seattle University broke ground for an innovative student center. Seattle University is one of the few organizations in the country to construct a building that achieves LEED certification by taking the entire life cycle of this student center into consideration. The school met this “green” goal by deconstructing the old student center building, salvaging as many materials as possible for reuse in the new structure, and recycling much of the rest. In only the first nine months, the building team recycled 54 tons of construction and demolition debris.
As seen with the construction of the student center, reuse activities are not hard to find at Seattle University. The school has a surplus store where used items like tables, blackboards, computers, and office equipment are sold to the public at “bargain basement prices,” saving more than 13 tons of extras from landfills. The university hosted a moving-out clothing drive, which collected 1,450 pounds of clothes. Plus, the Environmental Services Office gives away reusable mugs to incoming freshmen, and Food Services sells reusable mugs with which people get discounts on drinks across campus.
Seattle University knows that purchasing recycled products is just as important as recycling. Not only did Seattle University spend $17,000 on products with recycled content in 2001, it followed the policy that no purchases would be made from any vendor that does not recycle. Looking to the future, Seattle University is constructing an onsite composting center for preconsumer food scraps. In 2001, more than 46 tons of food went to a local composting facility. Starting in 2002, the school will compost onsite and use the enriched soil on campus grounds.
University of Oregon – OR
With approximately 23,500 people on campus, the University of Oregon generates significant quantities of waste. Hence the student-founded Campus Recycling Program, which strives to make recycling and waste prevention a priority. Organized in 1989, the program began with 160 paper collection sites. Today, it has greatly expanded— currently employing 45 students and five full-time staff members—to collect numerous materials at more than 1,500 sites throughout the campus. During the 2003–2004 school year, the campus diverted 48 percent of its waste through recycling.
University of Virginia (UVA) – Charlottesville, VA
UVA has found catchy ways to interest students in recycling. In a “Claim Your Can” contest held in 2001, students wrote their names on aluminum cans before recycling them. Across campus, cans were drawn from recycling bins and the lucky winners received T-shirts, gift certificates, and the grand prize of a CD player. This contest allowed the school to collect and recycle enough aluminum to prevent GHG emissions equivalent to 35 fewer cars driven in 2001. UVA will hold the contest again in 2002, with 100 percent recycled-content T-shirts as some of the prizes.
UVA also launched Printing Awareness Week, during which it promoted the conservation of paper through activities such as duplex printing and education about the impact of over-printing. Only one month after this campaign, paper usage in the campus computer labs was down by more than one-third, saving nearly one ton of paper. The school recycled an additional 1,700 tons of paper products.
University of Virginia (UVA) Division of Recoverable and Disposable Resources – Charlottesville, VA
The Recycling Office at UVA continually finds creative ways to increase reuse, recycling, and recycled-content procurement on campus. Educating students and staff about waste reduction is a fundamental aspect of the university’s program. For example, UVA Recycling distributed a mini-diskette to all first-year students explaining reuse and recycling on campus, and the office distributes a quarterly electronic recycling newsletter to area recycling coordinators. The Recycling Office also supports R.O.S.E., the Reusable Office Supply Exchange, an online directory that allows faculty and staff to donate and request office supplies that would otherwise be discarded. In 2000, five local organizations participated in the 2000 Student Move Out Program, collecting reusable items such as furniture, non-perishable food, and clothing for redistribution. They were able to divert 24.4 tons of mattresses into the hands of a nonprofit agency that cleaned and redistributed them. Additionally, the university collected more than 600 tons of yard waste for on-site composting last year.
Youngstown State University – Youngstown, OH
The energy of Youngstown State University’s Support Services (YSU) waste reduction staff extends beyond the boundaries of campus into the community. In 2002, YSU donated more than 6.5 tons of art, theatrical, and other supplies to schools and non-profit organizations in the community and also recruited local companies to join WasteWise. In addition, YSU downsized trash collection roll-offs by nearly 75 percent by holding a move-out donation drive; hosted a month-long lecture series and an Earth Day symposium; and recycled a variety of non-traditional items such as mattresses, computers, polystyrene, tires, and batteries.