Students Help Post Office Decrease Workload
Seniors Anna Clark, Abel Ngala and upper Gwyneth Crossman, students at the Green Umbrella Learning Lab (GULL) are working with Phillips Exeter’s Post Office to reduce the number of packages processed on a daily basis. The project was inspired by the visible need to decrease waste and help mail room staff work more efficiently.
“Education is the most important thing; it is good that we have students showing other students why they need to help us break down the boxes.” Crossman acknowledges the difficulties that they are facing."
The GULL is part of the Exeter Innovation program—a host of multidisciplinary courses added to the Academy’s course catalogue at the end of last year in the hope of extending the spirit of Harkness to extracurricular activities. English Instructor Jason BreMiller, who is also the Sustainability Education Coordinator at Exeter, worked with the Senior Manager of Sustainability and Natural Resources Jill Robinson to create the class. “In our collaborations we thought about pitching a course that would be based on the idea of having students learn more about the problems related to the environment in our school and actually formulate as well as execute plausible solutions, while getting credit for class,” BreMiller said. He uses the phrase “design-thinking class in sustainability” to describe the GULL, also calling it “a logical extension of the Harkness method into real life.” As an instructor, it is important for BreMiller to see students living the non-sibi spirit and taking on real community-directed initiative.
The 13 students in the class are split into four different groups, each focusing on one project that would help Exeter meet its Sustainability Master Plan and carbon reduction goals. “We divide the class into four stages,” BreMiller said. “Stage 1 is just brainstorming ideas, team building, and training; stage 2 is coming up with concrete group projects and writing down the ideas; stage 3 is execution and stage 4 is reflection.”
The Post Office project was created after a conversation between BreMiller and Mail Room Supervisor Joseph Goudreault, who expressed concerns about the recent increase in the number of packages delivered to the Post Office. According to Goudreault, the mail room receives an average of 200-300 packages a day, though the number is predicted to increase during upcoming holiday seasons like Halloween. “It’s been a 13 to 17 percent increase every year for the last three years,” he said. The problem is made worse by the fact that students do not pick up their packages the day they receive them, or if they do, are usually not mindful about having to collapse the boxes before disposing of them. Goudreault added, “We don’t have a storage facilities in the mailroom, if we don’t get 300 packages cleared out one day the next day 300 more come in.”
Regarding this overwhelming number, Clark said, “It is adversely affecting the environment through the amount of material that’s being wasted.” A big portion of the packages coming into P.O. are the result of students ordering online rather than buying things in Exeter. “With the ease of, for example, Amazon Prime, and the economic benefits that has for the buyer, people are just not incentivized to like buy locally any more,” she explained. It is important for students to know when they need to order something online and when they can go to a local store instead, especially because that way, they can “support local businesses and the economy here in Exeter so there’s a two-fold benefit.”
However, with limitations to what one can buy in Exeter within walking distance, many times ordering online becomes the only option for students. The Post Office project has already begun working to address that issue; taking advantage of Exeter’s alumni connections at Amazon, or big clothing retail stores like Urban Outfitters, the students reached out to Alumni Relations for support. “[We’re] seeing if we can get in contact with Amazon or other big companies and establish some kind of partnership…so we can sell some of their lines of clothing or whatever else students need here on campus,” Clark said. Upper Gwyneth Crossman compares these with “pop-up shops,” saying they would function like food trucks but for clothes and other daily necessities. The Post Office project has also gotten in touch with the campus bookstore so that they can stock up on new items and, as a result, more students’ needs are met right on campus.
Along with the reduction of incoming packages, one of the project’s goals is to teach students to break down and collapse their packages once they receive them. “Right now, [students] just throw them whole into the trash or recycling,” said Clark. If boxes are flat, transporting the boxes and clearing out the mailroom area becomes much easier for facilities to manage. Clark pointed out how, “in PO, they try to implement box cutters to help collapse boxes,” yet many students don’t even know they’re supposed to collapse boxes. The awareness-raising programs they will be running may include an assembly speaker, as well as the incorporation of “box-flattening” stations in dormitories.
Like other groups, the Post Office Project is also currently in the nascent phases of stage 3: execution. “So far, most of our work has been conceptual: sending emails, having meetings, drafting posters, drawing up sketches of what we’d like to have happen in P.O. and elsewhere,” Crossman said. They have been successful in reaching out to faculty members and Mail Room supervisors for help with the project. “I just met with the students last week,” said Goudreault. “Education is the most important thing; it is good that we have students showing other students why they need to help us break down the boxes.” Crossman acknowledges the difficulties that they are facing. “ Parents will still send things, people will still order online,” she said. “But we want everyone to be conscious of the environmental impact of shipping a package, as well as the hassle for Exeter staff if the packaging isn’t disposed of properly."