Trinity College (CT)
EN-10: Community Partnerships

Trinity has a partnership with Blue Earth Compost who collects our food scraps multiple times a week from numerous locations. We have back of the house composting in all three dining facilities and front of the house in the main dining hall. We also have a bin at two other locations where many events with food occur. Lastly, upper class students living in on-campus townhouses have the opportunity to get a compost bin for their house which is picked up by Blue Earth once per week. https://www.trincoll.edu/sustainability/sample-page-2/campus-operations/waste-management/

The community garden at Trinfo.Café brings together Hartford and Trinity community members as gardeners, supporting one of Trinfo’s core programmatic themes of building relationships between Trinity and its Hartford neighbors. The garden serves as a space for student learning and engagement, while also supporting urban farming to expand access to fresh produce in Hartford. The community garden at Trinfo Café was started by Trinity College, the aim of which is to strengthen the relationship between Trinity and its Hartford neighbors. This garden provides Hartford families with food security and promotes healthy eating by offering residents access to nutritious foods at a reasonable cost. Throughout the summer, community residents, Trinity faculty, staff and students grow squash, tomatoes, beans and other produce. More information can be found at https://www.trincoll.edu/cher/trinfo-cafe/trinfo-cafe-community-garden

Since the last time we reported on this program, we had just begun it in Spring 2019 but then the shelter that received our food started a major renovation project so they weren’t able to accept our food during the 2019-2020 academic year. As we were close to having a new partner, covid happened and that essentially put the front-of-house component on hold until Fall 2023. Fortunately, a student organization—Trinity Homelessness Project—stepped up to work with the Office of Community Service and Civic Engagement, as well as Chartwells (Trinity’s food service provider) to figure out what we wanted to do. Ultimately, we were able to get the project restarted in November 2022 and we were able to deliver prepared (but unserved) food for 21 weeks, alternating between ImmaCare (www.immacare.org) and the South Park Inn (www.southparkinn.org). Over the course of those 21 weeks, we donated 620 trays of food (trays were typically 13” x 11” x 4” deep). In addition, we were able to do some additional deliveries after Commencement Weekend and Reunion Weekend. We look forward to building on this foundation in the 2023-2024 academic year.

Bantam Bus Pass/U-Pass: Since 1999, we have worked with CT Transit to provide a bus pass for every student at Trinity that allows them access to the CT Transit bus system at no out-of-pocket cost to the student. We pay for this per ride and are billed monthly. The Student Government Association has been the primary funder of this initiative.