Hannah Jones/Winonan
On a typical day, a typical Winona State University student might go through a typical routine: print out the day’s lecture notes, grab a pop from the vending machine to stay awake for lecture and maybe go for some Healthy Choice pasta at lunch.
We see the notes, the beverage and the nutritious lunch. Here’s what we don’t see: 16 sheets of one-sided printer paper, an aluminum can and three different packaging components for one meal.
This year, Winona State students helping to organize the annual Recyclemania event—a competitive, eight-week recycle-off between college campuses nationwide—are trying to open the community’s eyes to recycling and its impact on the planet.
Winona State has participated in Recyclemania since 2009, when Cindy Jokela, a member of the university’s sustainability committee, spearheaded the movement.
Back then, Jokela said, the measuring component of the program consisted of students going around campus and actually peering into recycling bins, gaging how full they were and recording the results.
Nowadays, the Advanced Disposal waste removal service weighs its collection trucks and gives the data to a Winona State student statistics group to analyze and record on the national website. Keeping track of exactly how much Winona State throws away and recycles turns a largely invisible activity into a concrete number.
Last year, the 605 colleges participating in Recyclemania reported 94.4 million pounds of recycled material. To put that into perspective, that’s the weight equivalent of about 7,000 adult elephants.
Putting things into perspective, in fact, is an overriding goal of the Recyclemania program this year. Students in a communication studies class working on the event this year have broken into several streamlined task committees, and one of them is dedicated exclusively to maintaining an online social media presence. Two members of this task force, communication students Brianna Johnson and Tamra Van Den Elzen, explained the strategy behind their Internet campaign.
“Not everyone reads posters,” Johnson said.
“But a lot of people will sit on Facebook,” Van Den Elzen added. The two of them hope the combined force of the Facebook and Twitter feed for the event will raise student awareness and make Recyclemania more visible.
“Visibility” this year goes beyond even an online presence.
Another task force that Brianne Favaro is in is trying to make students “see” the impact of recycling on a very literal level. Starting in mid-March, every residence hall on campus will be amassing their recycled material and using it as a medium for a creative sculpture.
These green works of art will be judged at an upcoming Recyclemania event, and the winner will be displayed on campus for all students to see. Nicole Raebel, a committee member going for her communication studies major, is excited for the competition.
“Asking students to collect their recyclable materials for a month is a great way to display how much space they would be using in landfills if they had thrown those objects away,” Raebel said.
The competition, Raebel said, doesn’t just display how much we recycle: it also displays how much power we have as a community.
“It is a great opportunity for them to join forces and work together to see how much one group of students can accomplish when it comes to recycling,” Raebel said.
In a world increasingly troubled by news of climate change, of the ozone layer depleting, the ice caps receding, the oceans rising, the landfills stretching to capacity and the unstoppable machine of industry belching out more and more waste, it’s a hopeful thing to see nearly 100 million pounds of garbage—a staggering, visceral image, heaps upon heaps of milk jugs, droves of pop cans, hordes of cardboard boxes and galaxies of paper—taken out of the equation.
Seeing the results of our labor makes the end result, a greener, more environmentally friendly world, seem much more attainable.
“Yes, I am concerned,” Jokela said of the world’s mounting environmental problems, “but I am also optimistic. I think we can do amazing things when we work together.”
Recyclemania will continue until March 30. To keep up on the individual events and programs happening on campus, “like” WSU Recyclemania on Facebook or follow @recyclemaniawsu on Twitter.
But according to Jokela, the best way to take part in Recyclemania is simply to—you guessed it—reduce and recycle.
“We hope you are all excited to get involved,” said Raebel. “We are anxiously awaiting the judging ceremony to see what you all will come up with!”
For her and the residence halls, and schools across the country, the challenge is only beginning; and we have 94 million pounds to top.
Contact Hannah at [email protected]
