Students have seen beer cans and empty water bottles tossed on the side of the street or littering the woods thousands of times before. For some people this scene may instill some bit of fleeting anger, but for others, it goes unnoticed altogether.
For junior Rebecca Standard, who does recycle, this kind of scene is all too common. She said that while her friends have recycling bins, they often do not use them.
“I will go over and see the recycling bins practically empty, while the trash is overflowing with bottles, cans and paper in addition to trash,” she said.
Scenes like these are what officials in the University of Massachusetts Office of Waste Management (OWM) are trying to prevent. Recycling programs in the dormitories and public buildings are helping to reprocess everything from beer cans and water bottles to computers and books.
In fiscal year 2008 the recycling rate at UMass was at approximately 56 percent, according to OWM. That number is relatively high compared to other colleges and universities, said Lorenzo Macaluso, special projects coordinator for the OWM.
But the office said students are not aware of the impact they can make by recycling. There also does not appear to be any consistency between what living areas recycle better at a given time.
“There is no rhyme or reason to why one dorm does better,” said Macaluso. Professor John Gerber, who teaches a sustainable living class, frequently takes his students to the waste management site on campus.
And once at the site, they’re surprised, he said.
“Students are not aware of the world beyond their dorms,” Gerber said.
Besides taking waste out of the landfills, recycling helps reduce greenhouse emissions. The recycling cans tossed by students in one semester would save enough electricity to run 10,000 TVs for 139 hours. Students recycling all their paper would prevent over 20,000 pounds of air pollution and conserve 140,000 gallons of oil each semester, according to OWM.
“One water bottle may not be a lot, but when you put them together it adds up,” said Gerber.
Gerber practices what he preaches.
Instead of carrying his liquids around in a plastic bottle, he carries them around a thermos. He keeps a chocolate milk plastic bottle in his office. He said he sometimes gets a craving to buy milk, but then he looks at the bottle and decides not to buy one. In the waste stream, a plastic bottle may take up to 1,000 years to disintegrate depending on the kind of plastic, whether it is in a damp area or in sunshine, he said. And, he cautions, even when plastic bottles are recycled, they cannot be used in the same capacity because they lose quality.
All University paper is divided into two categories. The first is called “high grade” paper and it comes from academic and administrative papers. The “low grade” paper comes from the living facilities such as dorms. At the plant this paper is put into separate bins where it is then sent to the Materials Recycling Facility (MRF) in Springfield, Mass. It is here that the paper goes through another sorting. This time any high grade paper that got mixed in with the low grade paper while it was in the dorms is removed.
Standard thinks that students know the importance of recycling, but they often are not motivated to do it.
“I feel that everyone knows how important recycling is, yet for the typical college student recycling falls at the bottom of their priority list,” she said. “Finding ways to motivate people to go out of their way and use the extra energy is key.”
Motivating students is difficult and very subjective, but there are other ways that OWM is trying to reach out to the campus community. There has been confusion about recycling trucks that have the same appearance as garbage trucks taking recyclables away. That perception alone can cause students to doubt the legitimacy of the recycling on campus.
The plant has taken steps toward distinguishing the trucks by attaching “recycling” signs Macaluso said.
To further encourage the practice of recycling, OWM goes to the RA fair every year where they offer preassembled displays for the RAs. Since many RAs are required change bulletin boards in their halls every month, the promotion works as a way to illuminate the recycling projects. These displays feature pictures and facts about recycling.
Gerber does not think that students are interested in hearing professors talk about environmental issues, and he said that many environmentalists use scare tactics to get the community to recycle more. But Gerber has adopted his own unique approach for educating the community on the environment.
Instead of preaching, he uses reverse psychology. He asks: “Do you love where you live? Do you respect yourself?” If you love where you live, you will make the effort to take care of it. If you respect yourself and others around you then show it by managing your wastes properly. His hope would be that people come to this conclusion without ever hearing scare tactics. He thinks that student participation would be greater if they were educated by their peers.
The University does have one such program called Eco-Rep. It consists of students who are assigned to freshman dorms using their influence as upperclassman to bring awareness to environmental issues. They do this through slideshow presentations, group activities and informational flyer distribution.
Campus recycling is part of a bigger trend that is occurring at colleges all over the country as schools take steps toward “going green.”
The Princeton Review added a new category it its annual guide to colleges – a “green rating,” which gives points to colleges with environmentally preferable food, power from renewable sources and energy efficient-efficient buildings. Magazines and websites are also getting involved in nominating the greenest college. According to an article in The New York Times, 63 percent of college applicants surveyed said that a college’s commitment to the environment could affect their decision to go there.
OWM is currently working on a “bail out” campaign, referencing situations at which students leave and throw out tons of garbage. More trash is thrown out in May than in two or three months combined. Macaluso recognizes that May is a busy month for students as they prepare for finals and try to move home, but he offers a few suggestions. He said that students should start going through their files early, recycling papers and anything they will not bring home.
Rebekah Diamond can be reached at radiamon@student.umass.edu.
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