Victoria Hollo
Contributing Writer
The University entered a nationwide intercollegiate recycling competition known as RecycleMania on Feb. 10. The program was created in 2001 as a competition between Ohio University and Miami University to increase recycling on both campuses. Since then, the competition has expanded to over 600 colleges representing 49 states and four Canadian provinces. The competition is endorsed by the American Forest and Paper Association and the College & University Recycling Coalition.
The competition will last for eight weeks, ending on March 30, and members of the University community will be challenged to do their best to recycle more and reduce waste all around campus during this time. Encouraging students to raise environmental awareness and promote recycling participation, RecycleMania enters its seventh straight year of competition on campus.
“Schools report recycling and trash data which are then ranked according to who collects the largest amount of recyclables per capita, the least amount of trash per capita or have the highest recycling rate,” Merritt Pedrick, associate director of operations, said. “With each week’s reports and rankings, participating schools watch how their results fluctuate against other schools and use this to rally their campus communities to reduce and recycle more.”
Last year, the University came in second place among the Patriot League schools with a recycling rate of 19.15 percent. Throughout the entire competition, students and staff across the country collectively recycled 94.4 million pounds of waste.
Ginna Freehling ’15, president of the Environmental Club, warns students about skewing the purpose of the competition.
“In past years we have had conflicting views on the incentives for this competition and the motivation to recycle,” Freehling said. “We have seen students buy cases of bottled water so that their weight in recyclables increases. This is not the purpose of the competition.”
More information about the competition can be found on the RecycleMania website: http://recyclemaniacs.org/