LibGuides: Sustainability: Waste Management

Waste Management Committee Members

Cherie Barth, Coordinator, Student Activities/Admissions Office

Mary Beth Messner, Instructional Designer

Lindsey Crow, Adjunct Instructor, Sciences

Catalina Hurtado, Student, Mechanical Engineering, PTK

Val Mayle, Custodial Supervisor

Janet Miller, Admin. Assistant, IT & Engineering Technology

Joe Pfeiffer, Adjunct Instructor, Sciences

*Stefanie Smith, Sustainability Coordinator, Green Building Consultant

Steve Spradling, Director of Physical Plant and Construction

Geoff Starnes, Network Systems and Security Coordinator

Lacey Webber, Project Coordinator, Facilities & Maintenance

*Denotes committee chair

SSC Waste Audit #1

On Thursday, April 19th, the Sustainability Task Force completed its first waste audit. The team sorted through trash and recycling bins collected from office areas, classrooms, hallways and lobbies of a single anonymous building on campus. Here is what they found:

On a typical mid-week day, this building creates 145.5 lbs of waste.
Over 50% of this waste stream was deposited correctly into recycling bins.
Of the 69 lbs of trash collected, 26 lbs or 38% of it should have been recycled.
Items that should have been recycled, but were not included over 10 lbs of paper and 2 printer cartridges from the office areas and over 150 plastic bottles from the hallways and classrooms.

Why Does it Matter?

By: Dominica Evans, SSC Student

There are numerous reasons to recycle such as, cost-savings, conserving our natural resources as well as energy, and extending our landfill lifespans to name just a few. However these terms have been regurgitated so much that they have lost the impact to inspire. So I ask you to think about what happens when you place that empty pop bottle in the trash. You might think “It’s just one bottle, it doesn’t make a difference.” But I challenge you to think in a broader level, what if everyone had that same thought; how would the world be? Well for starters, if everyone in the world threw away just one pop bottle a year, it would result in almost 133,000 metric tons of waste. A little astonishing considering that equates to almost 60 Honda civics. Now let’s think about if everyone in this school threw away just one bottle a year, which would be a little over a quarter of a metric ton or 647 pounds. Unfortunately, throwing away just one bottle a year isn’t a real accurate description of the waste at our school. In just one day and in one building 165 bottles and cans that could/should have been recycled were pulled out of the trash cans. At this rate we would produce over 8 metric tons of waste per year in just bottles and cans or roughly 8 cows. A lot of the students here are mothers and fathers; we need to protect our future by taking a few minutes out of our busy lives to ensure that our children don’t suffocate under the mounds of trash we are producing.

Electronic Waste Recycling Events

Electronic Waste Pick-Ups

Dates: First week of every semester

During the first week of every term, Stark State College provides an opportunity for campus community members to responsibly recycle their electronic waste including computers, keyboards, printers, cell phones, computer monitors, VCRs, DVDs, cameras, game systems, etc... (no TVs will be accepted). Watch for the announcements on mystarkstate, facebook and the campus monitors. If you have questions before then, contact: Lacey Widder at lwidder@starkstate.edu.