University of Waste

How do you support a zero waste lifestyle if the university you go to doesn’t support it?

I decided today was the right day to talk about this issue since I decided to get dinner at our university’s food court. After not having eaten there in a year, I noticed the plastic problem we really have. If you’ve been to the movies you may have seen a small dispenser on the counter where a single straw would come out of. We had a similar contraption last year at this university for plastic silverware. Somehow this year we’ve gotten worse with our plastic waste and those dispensers are nowhere to be found. Now instead, there are baskets full of individually wrapped plastic silverware creating even more plastic waste.

Though most of the plastic in our food court is recyclable, there seems to be a surplus of garbage cans and not many recycling ones. Upon walking around, this was the common set up I saw…

Even the things that can be recycled are being thrown away because of convenience and more availability of trash cans. A university in Seattle Washington tackles this by providing more, and larger recycling bins while making their actual trash cans smaller and scarcer.

How do we fix things??

We begin with Language

The language of trash is exceptionally important. Have you ever wondered why some trash cans say “Landfill” instead of “Trash”, or “Waste”? There is in fact a purpose for this. When we read the word Landfill we are forced to acknowledge the end point, or, final stage of our trash. By using the word landfill, we are being told exactly where that Starbucks coffee cus will stay for the rest of existence. Now that we have this moral reaction, we will think twice about where we put our trash and how much of it we produce.

Universities with Composting

The University of Michigan in Ann Arbor is my go to example for a composting university. This past weekend I got to go down to visit my boyfriend who goes there. We went to breakfast in one of the many dining halls. The dishwashers must have been behind because there were disposable plates, cups, and cutlery for students to use. At first I thought this was a NIGHTMARE until I realized that everything that was out was 100% compostable. Even their tea bags come in compostable packaging. This school also composts its food scraps which is something not many universities do. At Oakland University when I ate in the dining hall and they were behind on dishwashing, they would put out styrofoam plates, cups, bowls, and plastic silverware. The dishwasher could be down for several days with hundreds to thousands of students eating with this disposable waste.

Make People Aware

Something the university of Michigan does well is advertise their objectives. There are signs on every trash can that ask you to make sure what you’re throwing away can’t be recycled or composted. There are posters and reminders on every wall to show they are trying to do their part for our planet. This idea of becoming zero waste is still very foreign to many people and organizations so making sure people know what you’re doing or what they can do, is extremely important.

My university just spent hundred of thousands of dollars renovating the place I ate dinner tonight. The new building is beyond gorgeous and yet, its plastic and waste problem has gotten worse. As I write the final lines of this post, I am watching the janitor clean out the garbage cans I posted a picture ofabove. He is now rolling an overflowing can of garbage away which I can see contains plenty of recyclable bottles, plastic containers, and paper people throw away here at school. We can and we should do better a community with reducing our waste.