T2T Collects, Offers Goods To Students

Trash 2 Treasure (T2T), a student initiative that reuses disposed student belongings with the hope of reducing waste on campus, began operating on campus after nearly a year of planning and organizing.

The group put its first project into place last spring in the coming weeks of students moving out of dormitories, an event that accumulates a surplus of waste.

During last year’s end-of-year cleanup, the group collected fans, clothes, furniture, school supplies, books, rugs, kitchen tools and supplies and other practical items that students would be able to use again when returning to campus this fall. The team meets in the Exeter Exchange, which is located at the back of the Davis center, where they are currently sorting through all of last year’s collected items.

The group was founded to address the large amount of waste accumulated every year by students moving out of their dorms, and the subsequent repurchasing of many items that could be recycled at a lower cost and environmental impact for all students. Many usable items were being thrown out, and items were not being recycled properly.

Upper and member of the T2T team Pedro Sanson said, “In previous years, students would throw away so many items that were in good shape and sometimes even new.”

“T2T is a good educational tool on how to run and manage a small business.”

The mission of this project was inspired by a similar project founded and run at the University of New Hampshire, where a group of students formed PLAN (Post Landfill Action Network) with a goal to create a zero waste dorm cleanout due to the egregious waste accumulated over the year.

Inspired by Climate Action Day, Sustainability Education Coordinator Jason BreMiller and Senior Management of Sustainability Jill Robinson spoke to PLAN about how Exeter could take action. Along with many colleges across the country, Exeter is the first high school attempting this program with help from PLAN.

The idea is to collect, sort and give back the materials collected. Although the plan is still in flux, the group hopes to either sell materials back to students at a very cheap cost or give it away for free and offload the surplus to local charity organizations who have constituents benefiting from the project. On the topic of sheer volume, BreMiller said, “We have more volume than we can possibly process, and so it’s important that we get it into the hands of people who need it.”

Coordinator of ESSO Liz Reyes explained how she sought out PLAN to help her manage the task of  “continuing to limit the amount of waste into the dumpsters by donating goods to the Exchange and working with local organizations to come pick up reusable items.”

The program is expected to be very beneficial to the Exeter community by preventing waste and allowing students to exchange items rather than throw them out.

This is intended to especially benefit students traveling long distances who can’t bring everything from home. Upper Meg Bolan said, “So many of my international friends have to throw down a large sum of money at Walgreens or Walmart as soon as they get here.” The dorm-cleanup left the Davis Center stocked with great utilities to serve students at a give-what-you-can basis, saving Exonians lots of money. Senior and T2T member Nora Epler said, “Honestly, once this is more organized, students should stop by the Exchange. If I had known I probably would have saved like $100-150 this year.”

The project intends to involve and impact every student on campus.

“We believe that everyone could work better on their waste management, and so we hope we can reach as many people as possible with our ideas,” upper and E-Proctor board member, Lara Galligani said.

When asked why she dedicates time to the program, Galligani said, “I work with them because I think that the amount of things people throw away on this campus is way too big, and I wanted to help work on a plan to lower the amount which is thrown away.” Epler expressed similar thoughts. “I really care about the environment and I heard about the zero waste dorm clean out initiative and thought it would be a good thing to bring to campus,” she said.

The program will also help students involved learn how to coordinate efforts and resources. Reyes said, “[T2T] is a good educational tool on how to run and manage a small business.”

Robinson hopes to also emphasize the other side of this project, which is the consumerism aspect. She would like to see conversation where students say, “Wow it looks like we’re buying a lot of stuff that we’re just throwing away at the end of the year” and take on the responsibility of reducing waste in the following weeks.