The New School
IN-1: Innovation 1

During Spring 2011, Parsons The New School for Design launched a pilot program that implemented a two-part strategy, one half physical and the other virtual, to effectively support the reuse and recycling of commonly discarded art and design materials, furniture, and equipment. The New School Green Fund provided the financial support necessary to begin. The website at http://green.parsons.edu/the-green-list is the online home for both The Green Supply Center and the Green List. The latter operates as Parsons' internal classifieds much in the way that Craigslist or the Freecycle Network function. Students, faculty, and staff post ads for any excess materials or items that might have some value. All students and faculty at the New School can buy, sell, and trade art supplies, textbooks, clothing, and other school items directly with each other through this portal. The Green Supply Center is the physical program that collects reusable or useful materials and items from the multiple waste streams across Parsons and the university, and makes them available for all students, faculty, and staff to claim for free. The pilot has proven even more successful at early stages than anticipated. This success has achieved winning other sources of internal funding within the university to continue the program for next year, and could potentially lead to establishing a third strategy to include a material distribution center to supply difficult to obtain “green approved” materials for student use.