Weis College House has new plans for “going green” and changing the recycling habits of its students this semester.
Weis College House has new plans for “going green” and changing the recycling habits of its students this semester.
Weis has ordered 30 new recycling bins that will be placed in each of its suites as part of a new effort to reduce the amount of recyclable material currently being thrown away in the trash bins.
The idea for the recycling bins came from a trash audit done earlier this academic year by the Wohlsen Center for the Sustainable Environment. The audit discovered almost 50 percent of materials thrown away are recyclable. Furthermore, an additional 25 percent of the waste was compostable. Due to these results, Daniel Freire ’14, a Weis resident, proposed an initiative to make Weis more environmentally friendly. This initiative was to buy 30 new recycling bins for less than $2 per person and put them in all of the suites.
This plan was completely student driven and was executed and financed by the Assembly of Peers, the governing body of Weis College House.
“We, the Assembly of Peers, have as one of our goals this year to increase sustainability in Weis,” said Amanda Loh ’13, chair of the Assembly of Peers. “After being approached by Dan and the Wohlsen Center, we knew we had found our ideal project. We hope that our recycling project will encourage students to properly sort their recyclables and increase efficiency.”
In addition, Weis College House is using other strategies that are more environmentally friendly. Weis has a green roof and has made smaller adjustments, such as eliminating styrofoam cups at bagel breakfast. The Assembly of Peers is also selling Nalgene water bottles and encouraging students to turn off lights when not in use.
“The students in Weis are committed to recycling and we are willing to do anything to make it one step easier to go green,” said Kate Snider, dean of Weis College House.
Freire is also hoping the new environmental initiatives will benefit not only Weis but the rest of the campus as well. He hopes this project will increase F&M’s standings in RecycleMania, a nationwide competition in February to see which campuses are recycling the most by weight. In addition, if the new recycling program in Weis is successful, Freire would like to be able to help the program spread.
“If this all goes well, all the other College houses will hopefully do the same as we did and put out new recycling bins,” said Freire. “I, and others at the Wohlsen Center, will work with members from other houses to give them a proposal for money and donations for this project.”
Freire thinks the program will be successful, and that over the summer the Wohlsen Center will be able to buy more bins for the other College Houses and for other locations on campus as well.
According to Freire, the bins will be distributed this week, but if students are not around when the bins are being put into the suites, Freire will have to come back next weekend as well to help distribute the bins. Each suite will receive one blue recycling bin, and once it is full, it will have to be sorted into the main bins in the hallways.
In addition to inspiring these changes in Weis, the trash audit performed earlier this year also influenced the development of another program. According to Kent Trachte, dean of the College, Kelly Kaufman ’15, a student of the New College House, presented the idea of “recycling representatives” to the sustainability task force last semester. This progam is called “Being Green for Eternity,” or BGE. It is an all-house recycling competition, in which there will be two representatives per house. These representatives will coordinate the recycling events in their house and, on a regular basis, the representatives will collect the recyclables from each room of their residence halls. The recyclables will then be weighed at the end of the semeseter and the house with the most recyclables per capita will win—the two representatives will receive a cash prize.
“This program is a competition among individuals who care about recycling to determine the most effective ways to maximize what’s actually recycled,” said Suzanna Richter, dean of the New College House and advisor of this program.
“I think this is a really great opportunity for students to take ownership of their consumption habits,” said Shawn Jenkins ’10, who works for the office of the Dean and is part of the support staff for this program. “All of the representatives will have to innovate and figure out ways to engage their peers in order to outdo their competition.”
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