The first time I went to a recycling center, I was amazed. It was the Wal-Mart recycling center in Lawrence and I seriously thought it was the coolest thing ever. My sister and I had so much fun separating all of the recyclables. But the thing I have come to realize is that most people hate taking the time to recycle so much, that they simply just don’t do it. Recycling is important because we literally have no space for waste according to recycling guide.org. We need to make recycling more accessible to everyone, especially to college students. Most of my friends that don’t recycle say it’s because they either don’t see a recycling bin close by when they need it, or that it gets too confusing to figure out which bottle or paper goes in what bin. Treehugger.com says that 1 in 6 people don’t recycle because it’s not available in their area. We need to make it more available to everyone, starting with the University of Kansas campus. I see recycling bins in my dorm and that’s about it. There need to be bins in all of the buildings on every floor and outside on the sidewalks. They should be just as frequent on campus as trash cans are. The bins also need to clearly say what is supposed to be put in them. I believe students on campus would use these recycling bins if they were easier to find and to use.
- Elizabeth
Editor’s Note: This post is one in a series published by students in the Sustainability Learning Community at KU. Additional posts from this series can be found under “LC” on the Categories list.
Ashlee said,
November 20, 2008 at 9:46 pm
With recycling being so important, I agree that recycling bins should be just as available as trashcans. With me, since I will forget to bring my can or newspaper with me out the door to recycle it as I leave, I sort them on my own in my room. You can easily purchase a divider and keep them in your dorm and use them like you would a trash can, and empty it at the same time. It does get annoying when I go to the recycle bins and everyone just threw all their junk in any bin, I think huge pictures would be in order, but even then some people do not seem to care, but I think its more due to a lack of education. At least KU recycling does still pick them up and sort them.
Keri Schreiner said,
December 1, 2008 at 4:24 pm
I think the University of Kansas has done a good job about getting recycling started on campus, but they could do more. I do see some recycling bins around, but they are few and far between. Also on campus they only have bins for plastic and newspaper, but they should expand that to also offer bins for aluminum and glass. The university needs to do more in the way of educating students about recycling and may need to put pictures up around campus and actually on the recycling bins so students know exactly what they can recycle. I agree with Ashlee that it is nice that KU does come around and pick up all the recycling and sorts it for everyone.
-Keri
Rion Glynn said,
December 3, 2008 at 12:44 am
KU does a good job at making recycling available across most of campus. But i still notice students throwing away plastics and other recyclable products. It might be a lack of knowledge or even just laziness that prohibits the students from taking the correct measures to recycle. It is very important and i think that every student should know where the recycling bins are located so that everybody can recycle.