While state budget cuts forced Nicholls administration, faculty and students to limit how much paper is used on campus, the Nicholls GREEN club has found this to be a perfect opportunity to make paper usage more efficient.With the assistance of SP Recycling in New Orleans, Nicholls GREEN-Go Recycle, End Environmental Neglect-has placed three large dumpsters on campus to recycle paper material.
SP donated the dumpsters to the University at no cost and will collect the paper each time the dumpsters are filled to capacity.
SP will then pay the GREEN club $15 for each ton of paper collected.
Andrew Simoncelli, Nicholls GREEN club faculty advisor, spearheaded the effort among faculty and already sees the dumpsters’ success.
“You can just look at all of the campus. The majority of your waste is paper,” Simoncelli said. “The dumpsters have been here a year. (SP Recycling has) dumped them a couple times already.”
On Aug. 31, University President Stephen Hulbert sent a mass e-mail to notify faculty and staff they can utilize the dumpsters to recycle discarded materials, such as printed paper, phone books, textbooks, magazines and various paper products.
Ross Durocher, vice president of the GREEN club, has seen how much paper is received and used daily at Nicholls and said most paper products are recyclable.
“Almost every academic building has a computer lab. Most of what comes out of there is paper,” Durocher said. “It’s pretty easy to place the paper in a recycling bin instead of the trash.”
The organization has collected paper on campus during the past five semesters through the use of green recycling bins placed in designated locations. At first, club members would collect the discarded paper from the bins and bring it in their own vehicles to a large recycling dumpster located at the Thibodaux Wal-Mart.
The recycling dumpsters, two located at the Student Publications building on Ardoyne Drive and one located near the tennis courts on the southeast corner of the parking lot, have made the job of recycling easier for not only the GREEN club members, but for the University community as a whole.
Durocher said students should be mindful of the amount of paper used daily and should take some some out of their day to recycle.
“That little step of recycling paper creates a big movement,” Durocher said. “What one person does can make a difference for all of us.”
Simoncelli said more students would be open to recycling, but a change of habit must occur.
“Most people are in the mindset that if we have trash, we will throw it in a bin somewhere. The more we recycle paper, the less trash we throw away,” Simoncelli said. “The less trash we throw away, the more we can save from being wasted.”
Future events for Nicholls GREEN club include a bake sale and raffle to celebrate “America Recycles Day,” scheduled for Nov. 16, and information booths in the Bollinger Memorial Student Union throughout the semester.
For more information on where to get recycling bins for a particular campus location, how to assist in GREEN’s effort or on becoming a GREEN club member, visit www.nicholls.edu/green.
