Okanagan College
ER-2: Student Sustainability Outreach Campaign

The College holds trash audits every year in coordination with different environmental or sustainability groups on some of our campuses. The intention of the campaign is to increase awareness of recycling options at the college and encourage staff and students to reduce recyclable waste going directly into the garbage along with reducing overall waste. The students separate the waste by hand and get a first hand look at what we all throw away. The audit results are then shared with everyone to help guide discussion on college wide reduction and diversion strategies. The campaign consisted of: 1)Purchase of a comprehensive series of recycling containers and distributing this throughout the campus establishing numerous recycling garbage kiosks at the College. Easy to read directive signage was displayed above the garbage cans to ensure staff and students were able to properly dispose of their waste. In additional, garbage cans were removed from classrooms to ensure that waste was disposed of only at these public garbage kiosks. 2)Articles and information were sent to staff and students about the campaign and audits. 3)Two waste audits were held on the camps to identify how well everyone was recycling their waste and benchmark how much waste the campus was producing on a given day. The audit was conducted in the campuses central courtyard and visible to the entire campus. The public and press were invited and covered the audit. 4)A composting program was begun with the College’s culinary arts program, cafeteria and Infusions restaurant. 5)The facilities department ensured that all of the offices and staff areas on campus also had proper recycle kiosks in their areas.

Results of the first audit benchmarked where the Campus regarding recycling success and waste audit. The second audit (Vernon Campus) provided clear results that there was less waste being generated by the campus and with less recyclable materials found in the general garbage