Sigma Alpha Epsilon (SAE), Beta Theta Pi (Beta), Phi Kappa Psi (Phi Psi), Phi Gamma Delta (Fiji), Sigma Phi Epsilon (Sig Ep), and the rugby house are now recycling, thanks to a project spearheaded by sophomore Zoe Kaiser and senior Wyatt Roscoe.
"I was an eco-rep for the Office of Sustainability. Part of our job was to look for gaps in sustainability around campus. I noticed, after being at the frats, that a lot of them weren't recycling and I wanted to change that," Kaiser said.
Previously, recycling was not ubiquitous among Hopkins fraternities.
"The frats are one of the biggest producers of recyclables on campus yet no one had done anything to get them to actually recycle it. That's why I was inspired to do this," Roscoe said.
The duo tried a number of iterations prior to settling on the current system.
"It started as a competition between the frats [to see who could recycle the most], but after that we decided that we wanted to give them the bins. It proved to be better to go through the city recycling program," Kaiser said. "So we talked to the organizers of Greek Life and got funding. Rob Turning in the Office of Student Life was really helpful in getting us the grants for the recycling bins."
Due to their efforts, the fraternities now operate under standard recycling policies.
"They can recycle plastics with numbers one through six, cans, clean paper, cardboard boxes and anything with a clear recycling symbol stamped on it," Kaiser said.
"They can recycle as much as they want, as long as they put it out for pick up on Thursdays," Roscoe added.
Roscoe and Kaiser were especially pleased by the reaction of the fraternities to the new program.
"The [fraternity brothers] were great about bringing it up at meetings. Basically whoever I talked to first was totally on board and willing to do this," Kaiser said.
"It allowed them to save money on trash removal, so that was a plus for them. The only reason we didn't get completely positive feedback was because for some of the fraternities, it wasn't an immediate possibility to implement this. We're working on that now, though," Roscoe says.
With their recycling project now off the ground, Roscoe and Kaiser are looking to expand it further.
"The next phase is to talk to frats that operate out of apartments and try to get them to be more environmentally friendly. We hope to bring more people into the project as well," Kaiser said.
"We're also trying to get the city to recycle Solo cups since they don't do that right now," Roscoe said.
Although pleased with what has been implemented thus far, both Kaiser and Roscoe realize much more can be done.
"This is a big step forward, but we still have a long way to go," Rosco said.
