As the 50th anniversary of Earth Day approaches, many of us are looking for ways to reduce our impact on the environment. This one-pager will get you started in minimizing your waste production. Try going zero-waste for a day! Here are SU Zero-Waste Tips and SU Zero-Waste Tips (COVID).
As strange as it can feel to hand your unfinished meal or empty to-go box to someone in the cafeteria, these are just some of the little things that Recyclemania, and the people behind it, are doing to make people more conscious of their waste. Seattle University is participating in its fourth annual Recyclemania with efforts to be a more sustainable campus—this time with a bigger focus on food sustainability and waste diversion.
Seattle University has a recycling contamination problem. Here’s what you can do about it.
Seattle University placed sixth among 170 North American schools in the waste diversion category of the 2018 RecycleMania competition.
Many of us have found ourselves standing in front of a recycling and garbage can, trying to decide where to dispose of the thing we just used. e pictures and labels on the bins around campus are helpful, but don’t encompass everything. Too often, because we want to feel like our efforts are contributing to something positive, we just toss it in the recycling because, heck, this could probably be recycled somewhere down the road, right?
Wrong. And unfortunately, this hopeful mentality actually does more harm than good.
On a wet day in front of the Lemieux Library and McGoldrick Learning Commons, students donned rubber gloves and rain coats to sort through a mountain of Seattle University’s trash. Plastic bags were piled high on tarps, waiting for their insides to be meticulously inspected and re-sorted by diligent volunteers.
The “Weigh the Waste” event held by the student-led club, Food with Spirit, discovered just how tall these piles are in an effort to get students to stop, think less about what they taste and more about what they waste.
The donated beds are avoiding a long train ride to the landfill, and are getting a second life with people around the world who need them—all part of Seattle University’s on-going steps toward waste minimization, and the University’s commitment to helping communities in need wherever they are.