1

Recycling at William & Mary

Lizzie Farquhar | Keyan Momeni | Lauren Post | Ben Whitlatch

Table of Contents

Executive Summary 3

Background Research 4

Stage 1 6

Research Objectives 7

Methods & Procedure 7

Key Findings 9

Hypotheses 12

Stage 2 13

Research Methods 14

Hypotheses 16

Key Findings 17

Limitations 22

Conclusions 24

Recommendations 25

What We Learned 27

Appendix 28

2

Executive SummaryToday, sustainable practices are a hot topic for businesses and institutions. The College of William and Mary is not exception. Since receiving a D- by the Sustainable Endowment Institute in 2007, the College has increased its sustainability and recycling efforts. Students are undoubtedly aware that recycling is a part of campus life, yet we wanted to understand how much students actually recycle and what they know about William and Mary’s current recycling initiatives.

We conducted market research to find out what students know about recycling at William and Mary and recycling in general. In order to gain insight into the minds of students, we first conducted focus groups to gather qualitative data. We used this data to conduct further research, which consisted of gathering quantitative data through a campus wide survey. Some of our limitations included obtaining a representative sample generalizable to the campus population as well as potential response error.

Our focus groups consisted of current 12 William and Mary students who provided valuable qualitative insight into the current state of recycling on campus. From our focus groups we found that many students were unsure about what items could be recycled; specifically there was confusion about solo cups and pizza boxes. Furthermore, students indicated laziness as a reason for trashing items that they knew could be recycled. Overall, very few students seemed aware of particular programs that William and Mary offered to properly recycle speciality products, such as printer cartridges and batteries.

The purpose of our survey data was to gather meaningful insight to support and further explore the findings from our focus groups. We administered an online survey to 101 students at the College, 82 of which completed the survey. Our survey focused on answering a set of 4 hypotheses. The survey questions were developed to understand students’ current recycling behaviors and habits.

We found that students on-campus do not recycle more than students who live off-campus. Additionally, we were able to determine the rank order of easiness to dispose of commonly recycled items. We also found that students who do not recycle pizza boxes and Solo cups do not report being more knowledgable about recycling than students who do recycle pizza boxes and Solo cups.   We did not find that more students think that Solo cups can be recycled than students who do not think that they can be recycled.  Overall, the quantitative data and statistical analysis from Stage 2 guided us towards future studies about student habits and the reasons underlying those habits.

3

Background Research

While researching recycling at William & Mary and in the surrounding area, we utilized articles from William & Mary’s website, including click through links on those pages, as well as finding information from the James City County recycling program.

Williamsburg, VA and James City County both provide curbside recycling, where you may recycle household paper, such as newspaper and telephone books, glass, metal cans, aluminum cans and foil products, cardboard, and plastic bottles or jugs #1 or #2. In Williamsburg, VA, the city recycled over 7,000 tons of recyclables in 2012 from businesses and

residents, including 37 tons of office paper and 8.7 tons of newspaper. ("Curbside Recycling Program.")

Within the context of Williamsburg, William & Mary recycles similar materials. William & Mary’s website contains a Recycling Initiative section within the Sustainability section that includes what you can recycle, where you can recycle, and how to recycle. On campus, acceptable material for recycling includes newspapers and other paper, cardboard boxes, plastic (#1 and #2 bottles only) and aluminum cans.   Unacceptable material includes paper or cardboard with food waste, plastic bags, and plastics with numbers other than #1 and #2. In administrative buildings, there are dark blue containers near copiers, interior entrances, and in kitchen areas, all of which are emptied biweekly.   In residence halls, each room has a recycling bin, which can be emptied into the recycling dumpsters outside.  Outside, there are recycling containers near many trash cans in high traffic areas, where cans and plastic or glass bottles can be recycled, and large dumpsters for recycle mixed materials, such as large cardboard boxes. To recycle old electronics and ink cartridges, students can go to Swem and the Post Office.  To recycle plastic bags, students can go

4

to Swem, Campus Center, Sadler Center, the Student Recreation Center, Botetourt dorms, Jefferson basement, Jamestown North and South, Landrum Basement, and the Daily Grind. The website also addresses where to recycle other miscellaneous materials, books, and batteries.  For more information, visit https://www.wm.edu/sites/sustainability/initiatives/recycling/index.php.

The College of William & Mary has improved its score on The College Sustainability Report Card over the past few years.  In 2007, The College of William & Mary earned a D- on the Sustainable Endowment Institute’s College Sustainability Report Card.  Alarmed by such a low grade, the administration implemented a new sustainability policy to be monitored by a sustainability committee. The College worked on t h e i r r e c y c l i n g p r o g r a m s , i n c o r p o r a t e d environmentally friendly construction standards into their major projects, and got the students involved in their efforts. In 2008, the College raised its grade from a D- to a C. In 2010, the College raised its grade to a B after a strong push from on-campus initiatives.   The report card does not address the entire issue revolving around recycling on campus.  The data was collected from June 2009 through August 2009, which is during summer vacation.  The surveys were also sent to “verified contacts at each every campus.”  The student survey was conducted by Phillip Zapfel, the “co-facilitator” of Student Environmental Action Coalition from 2008-2009.  Although Phillip provided insight to the The College Sustainability Report Card, his “expertise” does not represent the average William & Mary student.  

Although the research done by The College Sustainability Report Cards is valuable, the purpose of the data differs from our purpose. Whereas the The College Sustainability Report Card seeks to provide a report about sustainability on colleges nationwide, our research has a more narrowed focus on the recycling programs specific to William & Mary.

A full Works Cited for our secondary sources can be found in Appendix 1.

5

6

STAGE 1QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

Research Objectives

Stage 1 of our research project seeks to find insight into the minds of average William & Mary students to determine the factors that motivate students to recycle or not recycle.  Through the use of focus groups, we want to answer how important students think recycling is, what are their reasons for recycling or not recycling, and what can be done to improve student participation in recycling.

Methods & Procedure

Data Collection Methods & Procedure

Participants

There were twelve participants in Stage 1. Participants were undergraduate students at the College of William & Mary.  Participants were recruited by the our team through Facebook posts, emails, and face-to-face contact. There were seven male participants and four female participants. Of the male participants, two are members of Fraternities and live in Fraternity on-campus housing, three are members of the W&M Basketball team and live in a house off-campus, one is involved in Young Life and lives off-campus, one lives with a roommate in on-campus housing, and one lives alone in on-campus housing. Of the female participants, one was a graduate student with working experience in sustainability. A full list of Focus Group Participants can be found in Appendix 2.

Focus Groups

Two focus group sessions were conducted.   In the first focus group, three male participants and two female participants were involved, totaling five participants.   In the second focus group, there were five males and two females, totaling seven participants. In both focus groups, the moderator and one note-taker were in the room with the participants, while the other two team members observed from behind the mirror.  

7

stage 1

Materials

For the focus groups, we compiled an interview guide (Appendix 3) that was focused on understanding the importance of recycling to students and the major limitations that they face in recycling on a daily basis.  We wanted to learn about individual differences in recycling habits to understand how accommodating a campus-wide recycling program has to be.   We also wanted to see how varied students were in their knowledge of recycling.

Data Analysis Methods & Procedure

To analyze the data, transcriptions (Appendix 4) were made from the focus group recordings.   We first read through the transcripts, then analyzed the transcriptions in light of our research questions.  For each research question, we read through the transcriptions for answers to the question, then created Post-its for the answers and posted them beneath the relevant research question.   We then grouped the Post-its on similarity and common themes, labeling the groupings based on the themes we found.

Limitations

The selection method we used for our participants provides limitations. Given that our sample was a convenience sample, whereby participants were drawn from our circle of friends, there is the issue of representativeness.

We were also limited by the fact that we could not actually observe the behavior of any of our participants; we have to take them for their word.  As always with self-report, this can be problematic because they may feel inclined to say things that are socially acceptable and may hide certain behaviors.   The participants may also be unconscious toward some of their behaviors and therefore be unable to speak about them.

8

stage 1

Key Findings

Convenience

At Home

In response to nearly every question we asked during the focus group, the topic of convenience was brought up. We began our discussion by asking focus group members what recycling was like at home. Several respondents said that one or more parents was keen on recycling, which made the process of recycling at home easier on the participant. What respondents found as they came to William & Mary is that recycling was no longer convenient, or as convenient as it was at home. A girl in the first group said that her home in Charlottesville “went single stream, everything gets sorted, and we throw it all out then they split it up.” This was the highest level of convenience at home that we discovered. This participant also admitted to not recycling as much here because it is not convenient. Others stated that their parents would sort anything out of recycling or trash that did not belong and that the parents were usually in charge of disposing of the recycling.

In Dorms

Upon arriving at William & Mary, students found that recycling was no longer as convenient as it was at home. Recycling at school may seem convenient, as the school provides a recycling bin in each dorm room, but “if they only give you one bin for recycling, it’s going to turn into a trash bin.” If students do choose to use the provided bin as a recycling bin, some commented that if their trash is overflowing, they will put trash into the recycling bin or vice versa. They felt that this was a function of the bins not being large enough.

9

stage 1

Around Campus

Our participants also noted the lack of recycling around campus, particularly along main routes to and from classes. While they know that there are recycling bins around campus along sidewalks, they do not necessarily know where they are. They expressed a desire to see one recycling bin per trashcan along sidewalks, as they will recycle something if the option is right there. One student said if recycling is not available when he needs it and he needs to get rid of something, “consciously if I’m in a hurry and if I gotta go somewhere, I won’t [recycle].” Overall, the general consensus was there are recycling bins around campus, but there are not enough and that that are in inconvenient locations.

Fraternity Housing

One particular insight into recycling came from two members of fraternities in the first focus group. Both men live in the new fraternity housing on campus and both noted that large recycling bins have been placed in their kitchens. To them, this would seem like the perfect solution to cleaning up after parties on weekends, as they could take the bin upstairs and have all of the brothers recycle the empty beer cans. However, the barrier that they face is the threat of an alcohol violation for having alcohol containers in common areas or common area receptacles. Both agreed that if the threat of an alcohol violation was removed, recycling in the fraternity houses would increase.

Education

Knowledge

All of the students acknowledged that they had at least some background knowledge regarding recycling. The levels of knowledge differed from knowing “not much” to a graduate student with “experience in sustainability”.   Generally, the participants with the most recycling knowledge had some sort of background in recycling such as a member of Earth Society, or working for Community on Sustainability.

10

stage 1

Item Specific

Often times students acknowledged that they threw away items that could have been recycled which shows that these students do understand what items can be recycled.   The overall consensus points to the fact that student’s recycling knowledge is heavily item specific.  For example, almost all students know they can recycle water bottles, but some students are confused about whether they can recycle solo cups and pizza boxes.  Only one student knew that Williamsburg and James City County has a policy that they only accept items labeled 1 and 2 for recycling.

Where to Recycle

Students generally knew that the “blue bins” around campus are meant for recycling.  The majority of students were aware that William and Mary has recycling locations for special items, such as batteries and printer cartridges, but only a few knew the exact locations on campus.

Improve Awareness

When asked how recycling could be improved, many of the students acknowledged that improving education about recycling would be helpful.  Students suggested initiatives such as YouTube videos, campus wide e-mails, as well as a freshmen orientation segment to increase recycling education and awareness.  Putting signs above recycling bins pertaining what could be recycled in the bin was also a suggestion that many students believed could help improve recycling awareness.

11

stage 1

Hypotheses

The distance that a student has to travel to recycle and the number of recycling bins available on campus influences the amount of recycling at William & Mary.

Students who recycle at home will recycle less frequently at school, but more than students who do not recycle at home.

The more students know about what can or cannot be recycled, the more they will recycle.

12

1

2

3

stage 1

13

STAGE 2QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH

Research Methods

After reviewing our findings from Stage 1, we decided to redefine and refocus our initial research questions and hypotheses. Sifting through the focus group materials, we found that the factors that tend to affect a student’s willingness and ability to recycle are motivation to recycle and education about recycling on campus. We were more interested in diving deeper into our findings regarding students’ education about recycling. To explore these findings on a broader scale, we developed a quantitative survey, targeting it towards current students of the College. To create survey questions, we looked at our new hypotheses and determined what we wanted to find. We did a test-run on our survey by asking friends to read through our survey to ensure the wording was understandable and free of bias.  After adjusted our survey questions, we created a survey on Qualtrics (Appendix 5), using an Internet self-administered survey.

Our survey was divided into three sections. The first section was aimed at determining what the respondent’s recycling habits were. The second section asked about the respondents’ habits and knowledge about recycling. The last portion of the survey explored how much students knew about what we called “special items,” or rather items that are not #1 or #2. These items cannot be recycled in the blue bins provided by the school because they are not a #1 or #2 or because the item requires a special disposal process.

To obtain a sample from the William and Mary student population, we used convenience sampling.  We posted the survey link to our Facebook profiles and emailed the survey to friends. Although this was convenient for us as researchers, the data is not generalizable to the William and Mary student population. When we met our quota of 80 participants, we closed the survey link.

Once we closed the survey, we exported the data to excel, where we cleaned up the data.  We then imported the data to SPSS to analyze the data and to run statistical tests to prove or disprove our hypotheses.

14

stage 2

We ran independent samples t-test to determine if there is a difference in how often students who live on campus recycle versus how often studentswho live off-campus recycle. To determine the order of difficulty in ease of recycling for particular items, we computed the mean values for how easy students found the items to be on a scale of 1 (difficult) to 7 (easy) and computed paired samples t-tests between the items. We ran an independent sample t-test to determine if knowledge about recycling influenced whether or not students recycled party supplies. Finally, we ran a univariate chi-square test to determine if the majority of students believe that Solo cups are recyclable.

15

stage 2

Hypotheses

Students who live on-campus recycle more often than students who live off-campus.

Students perceive the various recyclable items on campus to differ significantly with respect to how easy they are to recycle; specifically, we hypothesize that the easiest (to most difficult) items for students to recycle on campus are: plastic bottles, paper, cans, glass jars and

bottles, plastic bags, batteries, printer cartridges.

Students who think that they do not know much about recycling are more likely to recycle pizza boxes and Solo cups than students who think that they do know more about recycling.

The majority of students think that solo cups can be recycled.

16

1

2

3

4

stage 2

Key Findings

H1: ON CAMPUS VS. OFF CAMPUS

We hypothesized that students who live on campus recycle more than students who live off campus. To test this hypothesis, we ran an independent samples t-test with our survey data. The two groups that we compared were students that identified as living on campus and students that identified as living off campus based on their response to question “on/off”. We compared these two groups to the mean response for the question “often,” which asked students to rate how often they recycled on a scale of 1 (never) to 7 (all the time). Based on Hypothesis 1, we expected to find that students who lived on campus would have a higher mean than students who lived off campus.

The mean response for students who live on campus was 5.04 (n=48) while the mean response for students who live off campus was 4.82 (n=34). This left us with a mean difference of 0.22. After running an independent samples t-test, we found that there was no statistical significance (p=0.583) of the mean difference between the two groups. This suggests that there is no difference in how often students recycle based on whether they live on or off campus, therefore we can reject our hypothesis. You can find the full SPSS output in the Appendix, Table 1.

17

IN GENERAL, students report that they know a moderate amount about recycling, with a mean value of 4.29/7.00 on a scale of 1 (very little) to 7 (a lot), with a standard deviation of 1.33

stage 2

figure 1

H2: RANKING EASINESS OF RECYCLING

We hypothesized that the easiest (to most difficult) items for students to recycle on campus are: plastic bottles, paper, cans, glass bottles, plastic bags, batteries, and printer cartridges. We computed the mean values for how easy students found the items to be on a scale of 1 (difficult) to 7 (easy). Our findings suggest that the easiest (to most difficult) items for students to recycle on campus are the following (corresponding mean values are in parentheses): paper (6.41), plastic bottles (6.24), cans (6.17), glass jars and bottles (6.05), plastic bags (5.10), printer cartridges (3.05), and batteries (2.61).

After computing these results, we conducted paired samples t-tests to determine which of the paired differences are statistically significant. Paired samples t-tests suggest that paper is easier to recycle than glass bottles. Paired samples t-tests also suggested that glass is easier to recycle than plastic bags (p<0.001, t=0.349), that plastic bags are easier to recycle than printer cartridges (p<0.001, t=7.804) and that printer cartridges are easier to recycle than batteries (p<0.01, t=3.44). The full SPSS output it in the Appendix, Table 2.

While our hypothesis was incorrect for the first and last pair of items on our list, we were correct in hypothesizing the rank of items 3-5. Items 1 & 2 and 6 & 7 merely switched one position in the rank from our hypothesis.

18

figure 2

stage 2

H3: KNOWLEDGE AND PARTY SUPPLIES

We hypothesized that students who think that they do not know much about recycling are more likely to recycle pizza boxes and Solo cups than students who think that they do know more about recycling.

On a scale of 1 (very little) to 7 (a lot), the mean value of education level for students who think that pizza boxes are recyclable is 4.08/7 and the mean value of education level for students who do not think that pizza boxes are recyclable is 4.50/7.00, with a mean difference 0.42. Independent samples t-tests suggest that students who do not recycle pizza boxes do not differ in reported education levels about recycling than students who do recycle pizza boxes (p = 0.149)

On a scale of 1 (very little) to 7 (a lot), the mean value of education level for students who think that Solo cups are recyclable is 4.15/7.00 and the mean value of education level for students who do not think that Solo cups are recyclable is 4.49/7.00, with a mean difference 0.34. Independent samples t-tests suggest that students who report knowing little about recycling do not recycle pizza boxes more than students who report knowing a lot about recycling (p = 0.259).

Taken together, these findings suggests that student knowledge does not affect whether or not they recycle pizza boxes or Solo cups. What could be a cause for the lack of difference is whether or not students think that pizza boxes and Solo cups can be recycled, rather than if they do recycle pizza boxes. To test this, we ran two independent samples t-tests about whether or not students think pizza boxes and Solo cups can be recycled.Independent samples t-tests suggest that knowledge about recycling does not impact whether or not students think that pizza boxes are recyclable (p = 0.149), nor does knowledge impact whether or not students think that Solo cups are recyclable (p = 0.259). This suggests that students who think that pizza boxes and Solo cups are recyclable do not recycle these items more than students who do not think that pizza boxes and Solo cups are recyclable. A full SPSS output can be found in the Appendix, Table 3.

19

stage 2

This could mean that students are not very good at appraising their knowledge about recycling. Some students who think they are knowledgeable about recycling obviously know less than they think they do, evident by the fact that they recycle pizza boxes and/or solo cups. Conversely, some students who think they are not knowledgeable may know more than they think, as they do not recycle pizza boxes and/or Solo cups.

20

students that think these can be

recycled

students that think these cannot be

recycled

Mean knowledge4.15/7.00

Mean knowledge4.49/7.00

Mean knowledge4.08/7.00

Mean knowledge4.50/7.00

stage 2

H4: RECYCLING SOLO CUPS

We hypothesized that the majority of students think that Solo cups can be recycled. In our survey, 47 students think that Solo cups are recyclable and 35 students think that Solo cups are not recyclable.

A univariate Chi square test suggests that there is no statistically significant difference between the number of students who think Solo cups are recyclable than the number of students who do not think Solo cups are recyclable. The SPSS output is in the Appendix, Table 4.  We cannot reject the null hypothesis, meaning that we cannot say that the majority of students think that Solo cups can be recycled.

21

stage 2

figure 4

number of students that believe Solo

cups ARE recyclable

number of students that believe Solo

cups are NOT recyclable

Limitations

Representativeness

In regards to sampling error, the convenience sample means that the results are most likely not generalizable to the entire William and Mary student population. We spread the survey through our friend groups because this provided large blocks of people that would answer the survey. This helped us ensure a large number of respondents, but as a result it may have made our sample more homogeneous and less representative, with many of our respondents being seniors and/or in sororities.

Sample Size

The size of our sample was another limitation to our study. Our sample had over 80 respondents, but a larger, more diverse sample would have been better. The survey results were processed digitally through Qualtrics and SPSS, so adding more respondents would not have made analyzing the data any more difficult.

Respondent Variation

Our survey also featured many interval questions. These can be problematic because the difference in what one respondent considers a “5” on a 7-point scale may be different from another respondent. This could have impacted the degree of statistical significance for our hypotheses.

22

stage 2

Self-Reporting

The self-report nature of the study also had limitations. This could have limited the legitimacy of our results in many ways. For one, social desirability could have affected how participants reported their responses. Since the survey was on recycling, a subject close to the environment and one with high social desirability, we think it is possible that many respondents overstated their recycling habits. The anonymous nature of the survey may have decreased this phenomenon. Self-reporting also could have been problematic in that it emphasizes respondents’ beliefs as opposed to their actual behavior. This creates response error in that people may not know their habits well enough to report their behavior properly. Their responses could emphasize what they think as opposed to what they actually do.

23

stage 2

Conclusions

We found it very difficult to find any statistically significant conclusions. Given the sample size, the results are inconclusive.  The sample was not only small, but was not representative of the William and Mary student population.  To generalize the results, we would need to obtain a larger, more representative sample.  Although we may still not find statistically significant results, the results would still be important to understand and would have implications for recycling initiatives on campus.

Further research would also need to be done to explore how frequently students are recycling, if they are recycling correctly, and, if they are not recycling, why they are not recycling.  We predict that students are not recycling frequently and that the reasons for this is because students are (a) not educated about what can and cannot be recycling, (b) not motivated to devote the energy to recycle.  We believe that students care about recycling, but that recycling isn’t always convenient for students.Our research suggests that students find some items to be easier to recycling, with the following order, from easiest to most difficult: paper, plastic bottles, cans, batteries, printer cartridges, and plastic bags.

We also collected data regarding whether students knew where they could recycle ‘special’ items on campus. These items included batteries, printer cartridges, and plastic bags. Through text response, 37 out of 75 students who chose to respond to that question indicated that they knew of at least one place where they could recycle these items. While we did not further analyze this data for this report, in the future we would like to use this data to determine whether students are influenced by any educational initiatives that the College implements.

Overall, we would need much more research to address these questions adequately. We would not only need a larger, more representative sample, but we would need to revise our survey questions to address our previous hypotheses and additional predictions.

24

stage 2

Recommendations

Extended Orientation

To improve recycling participation around campus, we recommend that the College make a number of changes. In the focus groups that we conducted, we noticed that there was generally confusion and disagreement over what items could and could not be recycled. A possible solution to this problem is that the College could add an extended orientation seminar on recycling and sustainability. Extended orientation seminars are mandatory sessions offered to freshmen students during their first semester at the College. The topics typically include education on racial prejudice, alcohol and drugs, and sexual assault.

Eliminate Alcohol Violations

We believe that eliminating the alcohol violations for fraternities and sororities would improve the recycling habits of those students. We discovered through our focus groups that Greek organizations get in trouble if they are caught with beer cans or other alcoholic containers in their recycling bins. This encourages these organizations to dispose of these recyclables through other means.

Educational Materials

It’s obvious from our both our qualitative and quantitative research that there is confusion over what can and cannot be recycled. It would be helpful to educate students at the point of disposal through placing labels on both recycle and trash bins. Labels on recycling bins could have pictures making it obvious which items belong in the bins. Labels on trash cans could have images of what can be recycled, encouraging students not to place those items in the trash. An example is located in the Appendix, Figure 5.

25

stage 2

Two Bins in Dorm Rooms

The College encourages recycling participation by placing a recycle bin in each dorm room. Unfortunately, students often use this bin as a trash can because it is the only one provided to them. If the school provided a recycling bin as well as a trash can in all dorm rooms, we think that students would use each bin for their respective purposes.

Advertise Special Sites

While sites for recycling special items (batteries, printer cartridges, plastic bags, etc.) exist on campus, we learned that many students do not know where those sites are located. The school could do a better job of advertising these locations. Swem Library is a site where many special items can be recycled, but exact recycling location is not very obvious.

26

stage 2

What We Learned

What we did gain from this project was valuable educational experience. We learned to make hypotheses simple and testable. Sometimes, we found ourselves coming up with either unrealistic and confusing hypothesis or hypotheses that were very basic and not interesting. We learned that we should have the research questions in front of us when developing our interview guide and survey questions so we do not ask questions that are not useful in answering our research questions. When developing a survey it is important to make sure that there is at least one question per hypothesis. We also could have utilized the backward market research technique to help us come up with more creative findings. We could have decided on a way we wanted to present our data, then decide what statistical test we would need to display that data, and then develop the questions from there. We were limited in this aspect because we did not know the different statistical tests when we were coming up with our research questions.

27

stage 2

Appendix

Appendix 1

Works Cited

"College of William & Mary College Sustainability Report Card 2010." The College Sustainability Report Card. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Feb. 2014.

"Curbside Recycling Program." Curbside Recycling Program. James City County, n.d. Web. 15 Feb. 2014.

Ducibella, JIm. "William & Mary - College Climbs RecycleMania Charts." WM.edu. The College of William and Mary, n.d. Web. 26 Feb. 2014.

Foley, Patrick. "William & Mary - Committee on Sustainability Announces Green Fee Awards for the Fall 2012 Semester." WM.edu. The College of William and Mary, 7 Dec. 2012. Web. 15 Feb. 2014.

Watson, Brian. "William & Mary - College's Green Grades Improving." Wm.edu. The College of William and Mary, 30 Sept. 2008. Web. 15 Feb. 2014.

28

appendix

Appendix 2

Focus Group Participants

29

appendix

Appendix 3

Final Interview Guide

• Introduction/warm-up questionso Ask for the following:

§ Name§ Year§ Major§ One main extra curricular activity

• Tell me about your recycling habits.o Tell me about recycling in your (parents’ home or wherever you live when you are

not at school)? o Does all of your family recycle?o What are your recycling behaviors at school?

§ What factors contribute to how you choose to dispose of your materials?§ How do you think students recycle at school?

o If you recycle, why?• Now think about the average W&M student.

o What are their recycling habits?• Barriers

o When on campus, what are the barriers that prevent you from recycling or that make recycling inconvenient/difficult?

o What kinds of things would make recycling more convenient for you?• What has W&M done to educate you about recycling programs on campus?

o How much do you know about what you can recycle on campus?o How could W&M improve recycling

§ (1) Awareness?§ (2) Initiatives

• If W&M made some of those changes, how do you think the behavior of students would change?

o Would these changes make you change your behavior?

30

appendix

Appendix 4

Group 1 Transcription:

Lauren: First, thank you for being here. Why don’t we start with kind of an introduction – not everyone knows everyone. Share your year, your name, your major and one major extra-curricular activity, and a fun fact.

Cadie: I can start. I’m Cadie. I’m a senior. Um wait, what are all of the things again? (laughs).

Lauren: Year, major, one major extra-curricular activity.

Cadie: Oh OK. I’m economics major, math minor. Um my fun fact, oh my extra-curricular is I’m on the dance team and then um my fun fact is that my mom dated Jon Stewart when they were both here. That is my stock fun fact.

Matt: I’m Matt. I’m a junior. I’m a bio and econ double major. Um I was on the rugby team for a while and then I broke my collarbone so I had to stop that. And my fun fact, I’ll go with the celebrity theme. I don’t know if you have seen Jersey Shore, but my mom is dating one of the girl’s dads in the show.

Bob: I’m Bob. I’m a junior. I’m a marketing major. Campus – I’m in ATO and I’m president of Club Golf. And I guess keeping with Jersey Shore theme, um my dad was Ronnie’s lawyer in season 1 when he punched the guy out and got arrested.

(Everyone laughs)

Jake: I guess it’s back to me? I’m Jake. I’m a junior. I’m a government major, history minor. Um, main extra-curricular activity, I do a ministry called Young Life with high school kids and fun fact, I’m in the Virginia National Guard. I do field artillery.

Sarah: My name is Sarah and I’m a senior, which is weird because I’m a social junior but just decided I’m a senior. I’m graduating at the end of the summer.

Cadie: Oh my goodness, I didn’t even know that, that’s so fun.

Sarah: And I’m a psych and kinesiology double major. I’m uh 20. And I am in DG with Lauren and I guess, so my family, like my dad’s family farm, the house and the last bit of land was sold to the drummer in the Dave Matthews Band. I’m from Charlottesville.

Lauren: Cool. OK well we’ll go ahead and dive into the exciting times of recycling. So just to kind of start

us off, I want you to tell me about your recycling habits just in general.

Sarah: I don’t really do them.

Jake: Like if it’s, if it’s clear like there’s garbage can and a recycling bin, and I know it’s recyclable, I will recycle. But currently I don’t have the recycling bin.

Sarah: I think a big part of it is my area at home went single stream, like everything gets sorted, and we throw it all out then they split it. Um yeah it’s a weird thing, I don’t know. I recycle paper, like if I’m printing stuff or I printed something wrong, I’ll recycle that. And cans.

Cadie: We have our lovely recycling bin in our room. We, like, last year we took Marketing & Society and one of the groups did a recycling project and apparently Virginia only recycles 1 and 2 or something. So like woah, I didn’t even know there were numbers and like to find out you can’t even recycle Solo cups and things that I have been recycling forever. So now, I’m sure I’m trying not to put the solo cups in the recycling bin. You know, baby steps.

Bob: You can’t recycle Solo cups?

Cadie: No. (laughs)

Bob: I did not know that.

Cadie: You learned something new!

Lauren: More fun facts!

Matt: I recycle a lot better at home than I do at school. At home I actually do like newspaper and cans and plastic and stuff like that. Here, I just throw things out for the most part.

Lauren: Ok so why don’t we build on that.

Bob: I’m kinda in the same boat.

Lauren: Yeah I think we all touched on that but tell me a bit more about your recycling habits at home or wherever you reside when you’re not at school, kind of, and how your family, what their habits are too.

Bob: Well I’m from New Jersey and like we always just have two different trash cans in the kitchen – one for trash, one recyclable. We have two garbage cans outside that were given by the towns. A couple of years ago they went from individual person’s garbage cans that you would just go to the store and buy and I think three years ago they actually gave you one – one blue one green – for recyclable and non-

31

appendix

recyclable so we do that. The trucks come around and pick them up, so it’s easy to do at home but here it’s not as easy I guess. I do a lot of cans because I live in a fraternity house and before we have an event, you know, we’ll change out the garbage cans and most of the stuff that’s going in there is either paper or cans, or Solo cups, which I thought were recyclable until three seconds ago. But, that’s like, I’ll throw that in the recycle dumpster because it’s mostly cans. That’s about it for here.

Cadie: My dad’s pretty intense about recycling. He like picked up this like new habit I think as more kids leave the house. So he even like takes the electronic recyclables, like brings them to the plant, or there’s like a day a month where you can recycle your old TV’s, computers, and other electronics, and stuff. So he gets very angry if I like throw a can in the trash or something.

Jake: Yeah my dad will do the same. Like if he sees something in our trashcan that’s like big enough he’ll make you dig it out or like vice versa. He always gets really made at my mom. He also recycles light bulbs, like take them to Home Depot, which I guess is a thing. So he’s really the stickler on that and I guess I gained part of that. I think it’s more of a convenience thing. But I don’t have a separate recycling bin and I’m not going to actively pursue recycling.

Sarah: I’m pretty sure it’s single stream, at least that’s what I was told, that it all goes to one place.

Jake: And that you’re just throwing away everything.

Sarah: Yeah or that. Yeah. I’m pretty sure that changed in the last year. Maybe that’s a lie. I don’t know.

Lauren: Ok, so thinking about the average William & Mary student, what do you think their habits are?

Matt: They’re probably pretty bad.

Cadie: Yeah

Matt: The average person doesn’t really recycle much here.

Sarah: I don’t know. I would say that, because freshman year you get a recycling bin in your room.

Bob: But you don’t get a trashcan so people just use it as a trashcan. I did it freshman year.

Sarah: Really? I thought there was a black one. There was definitely a black one. The problem is that we would run out of space in the trashcan and the papers that were in the recycling bin would then have stuff put

on top of them and then, yup. But there were times when we would purposely go recycle that stuff.

Cadie: I think William & Mary students compared to our whole age demographic are probably pretty average. I wouldn’t say that we’re worse but we could be better now that there are more recycling bins everywhere. Especially in Swem when you have lots of paper to throw away.

Sarah: I think we’re pretty aware of it relatively speaking.

Matt: You mentioned how like you guys recycle all of your cans after parties and stuff, right?

Bob: Well it’s not like a concerted effort. It just kinda happens because, I mean everyone cleans up their rooms before parties, so a new trashcan, and the only thing that goes in there are just empty cans really. No one’s gonna just toss that, you carry a big black bag of rattling cans, you’re not going to toss that in the dumpster, you’re going to toss that in the recycling.

Matt: A lot of people are bad about that in my house, the KDR house. People just throw like all of their trash into one trash bag and throw that in the garbage can.

Jake: I’m fairly cynical. I feel like most students, just our demographic in general, it’s a convenience thing. You see all of the stickers on trash cans that say like “stop”. Yeah like heading to the landfill. But unless there’s an alternative, unless there’s a recycling bin right next to the garbage can, no one’s going to pursue recycling elsewhere so it just kinda goes in the trash.

Cadie: Like then you have to get down to the numbers, you have to wash like different stuff that you’ve used. And you throw away like one bottle that you didn’t wash or one thing that isn’t the right number, it can mess up the whole unit of recycling that you threw out. That one thing from Marketing & Society really stuck with me. It was really scarring. Like all this time I’ve been throwing out my little recycling bin and feel so good about myself and then to realize I’ve probably been doing it wrong and messing up recycling for everyone.

Bob: I feel like every bag I’ve put in the dumpster, I’ve messed up the system now.

Matt: I didn’t realize if you put something wrong in there it would mess up the system.

Cadie: I don’t really know, this was one presentation, but that’s what they said. It was scarring.

Lauren: (laughs) Never recover from that. So

32

appendix

you kinda touched upon some of the barriers, where like if it’s not next to it, what other barriers do you see or can you elaborate a bit more about barriers to keep you from recycling?

Matt: Well one thing, [name] sent out an email to us saying like you know if we put a big recycling bin in your house and wouldn’t penalize you for putting beer cans and stuff in there, do you think you’d be more likely to recycle and we were like yeah. It would make a big difference.

Bob: They just put that in.

Matt: Oh did they? For you guys?

Bob: Yeah last week. Do you guys have one?

Matt: No not yet.

Bob: Yeah we got one. It’s in a weird corner of our kitchen.

Sarah: What is it?

Bob: It’s a giant recycle, blue garbage can, which just showed up this week.

Matt: Yeah I think it would be helpful if we got it.

Jake: Education too. People won’t necessarily know to look for 1’s and 2’s or to even know what a 1 or 2 would be to recycle that.

Bob: We were separating in our kitchen I’ve noticed though. During rush, we had like chili, and like a lot of brothers cook and don’t have meal plans so like they actually cook and I noticed the guys have been separating cans and plastics from the black trash bag that we have in there. Now we have the blue bin and we just toss it in there but even before we had that I noticed a couple of guys, there was like a pile in there.

Cadie: I think one of the main barriers for me is the pile aspect. I don’t want like piles of trash sitting around. Like if our, if I didn’t have a recycling bin ready, like readily available, then I would probably just throw it away with the alternative being like a pile of papers and cans in the corner of my room for a long time.

Lauren: Ok, so what other kind of things do you think would make it more convenient for you?

Bob: I mean having that big thing in the kitchen helps.

Lauren: Yeah

Bob: It’s just the, I guess that most it the stuff got separated but we didn’t really have a set bin. Like it was just kinda on the floor in a pile. We had one of the bins from the rooms, one of the really small ones, and that helps just as a very clear distinguisher for this is trash and this is recycling. Because I know when I pass it, like on campus and stuff, if I’m walking out of dining halls or something and I have a can in my hand, when there are two next to each other, you’re not just going to toss it in the trash, you’re going to put it in recycling.

Cadie: I think an information sheet would be helpful so I would know “oh it’s ok if I didn’t wash out this glass jar, it can still be recycled.”

Sarah: I think that’s a big part of it. Like I didn’t know that it is the case that if you throw this in with all of your 1’s and 2’s like whether that messes it up.

Cadie: It’s only certain things, but yeah.

Sarah: But also like if it you know, can’s half full of soda or quarter full, I mean ideally you dump it out but there’s still soda in there, is that an issue? That kind of stuff. I don’t know if there’s really a feasible way to educate. You know people do that and you get the fliers posted places but I don’t know.

Jake: Well what making it part of orientation for freshmen? Like one of the classes or like I don’t know, any other classes, but having that, having sustainability being one of the other things. Because I remember a lot of things from freshman orientation, surprisingly.

Cadie: Or like a little cheat sheet, like the landfill stickers except like 10 things you should know about recycling on the recycling bin.

Jake: Or post it frequently throughout campus.

Sarah: I think when it comes to college kids it’s all about making it easy. It’s got to be convenient. It has to be there labeled with bright colors.

Cadie: I do think that there is some guilt associated with it. Like if I was holding something like a can that I know is definitely recyclable, I would definitely feel guilty putting it in the trashcan. There are barriers but if you provide them, people would hop on it.

Lauren: So do you just mean having, making it more available.

Cadie: And knowing exactly how to do it.

Lauren: Ok so what do you all know about recycling on campus?

33

appendix

(some laughs)

Bob: That it exists.

Matt: That there are a couple of bins.

Jake: There are a few. You have to look for them.

Matt: I mean there are a couple of places like they’ll have the regular trash can and a recycling one next to it, but that’s not true for every garbage can. Like it wouldn’t be that hard for them to put another one next to it.

Lauren: Like we have one over here.

Cadie: The B school is very good at recycling. Outside the B school, mmm.

Lauren: Well we’re LEED certified.

Cadie: I think it’s also like the old academic buildings like so many things. Like why can’t we have bathroom stalls that are up to my boobs in Morton? I kinda want that a little more than I want recycling bins so…haha sorry about that.

Bob: Those lids are cool too. The ones that like for the recycle bins that are purely cans or paper. They either have the slot for the can or the slot for the paper. Because that’s literally like I can’t toss anything in there, you know.

Lauren: That’s smart.

Bob: And when I see it I want to put the can in the hole.

Lauren: So besides the bins that are shaped, what do you think William & Mary has done to educate you about the recycling programs that are on campus?

Jake: I don’t know about the programs. Like I said, the only thing I’ve seen are the little landfill things.

Matt: I always see on like the doors of the Caf that Virginia is the number one in recycling but it never says anything about William & Mary or anything like that.

Sarah: I mean I guess that kind of falls under like Williamsburg, like waste management whatever and is less like a school event program.

Bob: I occasionally see a flyer but who stops and read a flyer? I don’t say that to be mean but like it’s true.

Cadie: And there are so many like important things we should be thinking about as college students, you know like saving the poor all those. Like there are flyers for so many things and recycling would just get lost in the mix.

Sarah: I feel like I sat through too many seminars in high school about it. Like when you said we were talking about recycling there was this instant *cringe* moment. But I do remember certain things, like you’re not supposed to throw out caps of certain bottles.

Cadie: its like I need to read a whole manual so I know what to recycle.

Lauren: So what do you think William & Mary could actually do then?

Cadie: Definitely like a fun facts about the numbers and washing and everything.

Bob: I believe in something like you said – add it to the orientation.

Jake: May as well

Bob: You know the sea of stuff you have to sit through for orientation when you’re a freshman, it certainly won’t hurt adding something about recycling.

Sarah: I think that and just scattering bins everywhere. Everywhere everywhere.

Jake: Like yeah every place there’s a trashcan put a recycling bin next to it.

Bob, Cadie, Sarah: Yeah.

Sarah: If it’s there.

Bob: Yeah if it’s there and I’m going to throw something out, I’ll put it in the recycling bin. If it’s not, consciously if I’m in a hurry if I gotta go somewhere I won’t.

Sarah: But I’ve definitely been in places where all I can find are recycling bins.

Cadie: Yeah

Sarah: Like I just want to throw this out. But that’s less of an issue here.

Lauren: Are there like particular locations that come to mind? One way or the other?

Sarah: OK so I was just flying and that was a major problem in the airports and I couldn’t

34

appendix

find but that’s in an airport, not on William and Mary campus. I just got really frustrated because it was like paper, cans, class, plastic bags. I just want o throw it out.

Cadie: I think it’s the walks. Like if I’m like drinking a Gatorade and walking to class, to throw it away I have no idea where recycling bins are. Like either they just come up on my walk or there aren’t any. And then you’re like no!

Sarah: What about like cardboard coffee cups?

Matt: I was just thinking about that. I don’t know if they’re recyclable.

Sarah: [inaudible]

Cadie: I’m probably going to go home and look it all up.

Lauren: So um do you think in terms of William & Mary, and kind of elaborate on this, it’s more about awareness or the actual initiatives on campus, what do you see as a bigger problem?

Jake: What do you mean by initiatives?

Lauren: Kind of like is it there’s like a lack of bins around, for example, or is a lack of not knowing what to recycle or is it something completely different, where it’s something like people don’t care? Jake: I wouldn’t say people don’t care. Well OK caring, like we’ve been talking about, it’s, if people have the option they will obviously choose, or most people choose to recycle something, what they can. So I think just on the basis level it’s the availability for the alternative to recycle and on the secondary level we can talk about education of just knowing what to recycle then. But I feel like more recycle bins would have to come first.

Matt: Yeah I agree with that. You know if you have the option, you’re going to recycle, but like she just said about coffee cups, I feel like they could be recycled but I have no idea and those are the things I throw out the most. You know, coffee cups and stuff like that. There definitely needs to be a bit of an education portion too. Because I just think of like cans and bottles to recycle. And newspapers.

Sarah: I think it might be useful, as opposed to just a generic like these are numbers, you can recycle cans, but make it specific. So make it like “that coffee cup that you are always buying, you can do this with.” Or like “remember last time you were running from point A to point B, and you were holding that thing from X.”

Jake: It’s like an ad campaign almost.

Sarah: Yeah but make it relatable, make it so like that people tie that fact to like something in their life. I think they’re going to be more likely to remember that if they’re then holding that coffee cup and think oh I remember reading that specifically.

Jake: Like specific to William & Mary students. Like “Hey that Flat Hat you’re holding.”

Matt: Or “That Wawa

Sarah: Yeah or the Wawa cup. Exactly. Like stuff like that I think would be, I don’t know. That would take some time thinking about things that we’re throwing away the most that could be recycled.

Cadie: I agree

Sarah: I think that would make people remember the facts more.

Cadie: Especially if you could put the little fun recycling fact about like the specific item at the specific place. So like, at the Grind, like all coffee cups are recyclable. Or like at Wawa, the plastic bags and the plastic cup. Your to-go box.

Sarah: Yeah! To go boxes! Those are things we definitely throw away on a daily basis.

Lauren: OK so you think if William & Mary made some of those changes, do you think students would do some more? And how do you think just behavior in general in students would change?

Cadie: I think people want to. I feel better when I recycle, so I’d be into it.

Sarah: I don’t think it’s that people don’t want to, I think they just aren’t thinking about it and so they need a way to remember as they’re going to throw it out that they shouldn’t or it’s just not readily available.

Bob: I think if you present people with the choice to recycle or not recycle, everyone here will recycle if it’s just as easy and if you put two trashcans next to each other it’s just as easy. And I think it will engrain this habit, people will start recognizing what they’re doing. It’s not, I don’t think they’re going to change their behaviors that much and won’t think “oh I feel so much better about myself” just because.

Cadie: Like a whole new woman!

Bob: I mean it’s good that you do, I’m not saying it’s not. I don’t think people will after

35

appendix

recycling go out and start a recycling initiative, but I think they will subconsciously or consciously start being more conscious of it. Um more aware of it eventually. But you have to give them the choice and a lot of times they don’t have a choice - they have a trashcan, something they need to get rid of and someplace to be.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: This is going back a little bit, but you mentioned you guys like, looked at recycling initiatives the school has taken and I just remembered that the Caf or Sadler, I’m not sure if it’s both or just Sadler, has tried reusable to go boxes. Like I’ve never actually seen one and I wouldn’t know where to get one.

Bob: I’ve seen one.

Matt: You’ve seen one.

Bob: I’ve seen one.

Sarah: They’re green right?

Matt: Yeah like I’ve seen pictures of them but I wouldn’t know where to get one, like what I would have to do with it. So like they have the option but they don’t make it easy to use.

Cadie: Also I feel like it’s gross.

Jake: Yeah I feel like I wouldn’t. Because then you have to carry it back.

Matt: Yeah it’s a little ridiculous that you have to take your to go box home then bring it back. It’s like even the programs they have they don’t explain or advertise very well.

Cadie: And I think if it became a wide, like there was the ability to recycle everywhere, then it would become kind of a social thing. Like you wouldn’t want to be that kid who is blatantly not recycling.

Lauren: Good thinking.

Cadie: That’s a little weird (laughs).

Jake: I think if you establish the mindset. Like even when you go back home, like oh I normally put this thing somewhere different than a trashcan. I guess there’s convenience there too but at least they’ll be thinking about it. Then you could change consciousness.

Lauren: OK so you guys have kind of talked about the average William and Mary student. But you know, the

whole statistics average sometimes doesn’t capture everything and we don’t know how wide the difference is, so what kind of differences do you see in students, like what’s the kind of disparity in terms of their behaviors, and why do you think they’re there if there are any?

Bob: Now? Or what could be?

Lauren: Both. Now and what it could be.

Jake: Like do you know people who are super recyclers?

Lauren: Yeah.

Sarah: I don’t think I know any super recyclers.

Jake: I’m sure they exist.

Bob: Kind of like that one person who will carry the recyclable [inaudible]. I think most people just are I mean I think our age group has gown up with starting to get these signals of recycling and they care about the earth kind of patterns as we go through middle school and high school so I think people are conscious of it and given a choice they would. I think it’s all about accessibility is the big thing. Personally, I have the recycling bin the school gave me but I bought a trashcan for my bedroom. But I know sometimes at parties those get blurred because the trash just piles up. But I think that if people had more of a choice of easy accessibility you would see a trend.

Jake: I feel like super recyclers, which is a lot of people I know, but like if I’m in TJs or something like I’ll see a bunch of people using recyclable cloth bags.

Bob: My mom has those.

Cadie: I use those.

Lauren: I do too.

Jake: See to me that’s a little above and beyond average.

Sarah: I think if you literally just stuck to trashcans in every single dorm room I think that’s a big step. To have a recycle bin and a trashcan as opposed to just a recycling bin.

Cadie: I don’t think there’s a lot of people on the outskirts or even in the hard negatives. Like I’m sure there are a couple of people who think it’s all a scam or it can’t work. Just like there are only a few people like my dad who will sit on the highway for three hours to drop off our old TV. Alright dad. I

36

appendix

think most people if the fall mostly not recycle then they could be easily persuaded and people who fall in more likely to recycle could get better. More in the middle.

Lauren: Ok, anything else about, so big changes you kinda talked about, having more trash bins in the dorms but then more kind of pairing up of the trashcan to recycling ratios.

Matt: The thing about the trashcans in the dorms is that they’re small. It would be more helpful if they gave you one big one versus a couple of small ones. I know in my freshman dorm we had like a trashcan, like our own personal one then they gave us that small blue one that’s only like this big so you throw 3 or 4 cans in there and it’d full then your trashcan would get full then you would just throw things wherever because you didn’t want to take out the trash.

Sarah: I agree.

Matt: So if it was a big one that you could fill up bunch and only take out once in a while people would be more likely to actually consistently put recycling in there.

Cadie: Especially because the cleaning staff would take out, I know that we had a big recycling bin in the kitchen that the cleaning staff would take out but we would abuse it because they knew they didn’t have to take it out so they would throw random stuff in the recycling bin because there wasn’t a trashcan. But if there was both, a trashcan and a recycling bin, that the cleaning staff took out I think people would hop on that because it would also take away how frequently they had to take out their own trash.

Lauren: Do you mean that in common areas or in dorm rooms?

Cadie: Like the way it is now, a trashcan and recycling bin per hall and trashcans in the bathrooms.

Sarah: I just remember we would always get angry emails about personal trash being thrown into the hall bins.

Bob: That’s true. We’d get those too.

Sarah: Yeah so I think that would be an issue. Because I mean our trashcans would be in the kitchen so you would have all of the food and you’d be cooking, as opposed to personal stuff. Though theoretically recycling isn’t gross, right? It’s paper and empty things right. So like maybe you could have a big bin for a collection spot on the hall without it getting gross.

Cadie: [inaudible] in the house. Like in the big recycling bin.

Lauren: Yeah this is true. Go DG. I swear to God [inaudible] DG is awesome at recycling.

Cadie: Apparently ATO is whooping KDR at recycling.

Bob: Did [Shylan?] really say that we won’t get into trouble if we put beer cans in there?

Matt: I’m not sure if it was an email from [Shylan] or if it was like, it might have been someone doing their own personal survey but I got some email about recycling where that was like if we had some centralized thing where we wouldn’t get penalized for beer cans if that would help with recycling I said yeah that would help so much.

Sarah: That’s smart.

Bob: I mean I know just from our standpoint, when we have events at the house, everyone just cleans their own rooms. So if we had a situation where, and this can we got is BIG, like twice the size of our trash can, we could bring that up, just stick it in the middle of the hallway and just have everyone come out and bring their trash and cans out, that’s very clearly recyclable so that would get guys to stop mixing their trash then throwing it, like when I throw that big bag into the recycling bin I’m sure there’s stuff in there that’s not recyclable and just got there during the party but I figure it’s mostly cans so maybe I’m doing good, I don’t know. But if we, if fraternities loosened that rule, cuz right now if they find beer cans downstairs in a common area, even in trash cans, we get an alcohol violation. So if we lifted that, that’s why if you ever go to events that’s why upstairs it’s so policed by the fraternity. So if we brought a can up, throw all the cans in there, bring it back down and have the cleaning staff take it out, we might have something.

Matt: Yeah like at a party you make a lot of cans and bottles of waste. And to people who live there it’s a lot.

Sarah: I think that’s one of the times I do recycle is the next morning after I have a pregame in my aparment. That’s when you go around picking up everything and the majority of it is recycling, because you know most times you have more trash. But that’s all, I don’t know. I think what they’re saying is important. And I get it if underage people live there if that’s the problem. It makes sense.

Bob: I know we’d do it.

Matt: Yeah.

37

appendix

Lauren: And what about off campus? You two live off campus? So are there any differences or are there any differences from when you’re off campus from when you come to campus?

Sarah: Off campus, I live in King and Queen’s and there’s a dumpster and there’s the recycling dumpster. And most of the time we’re pretty good about it. But it’s mainly the morning after cleaning, if we recycle it’s then, or if we have a box or some deal.

Jake: Yeah I think we have to pay extra for recycling because I live in James City County so we’re a part of their system. I guess my housemates and I have chosen not to pay. It’s only $20. You have to pay for the bin and it’s a yearly service and if you’re already paying for trash. Yeah so it’s all convenience for me because I’m going around from class to class then I’m out. So it’s more like if I have something on campus I’ll recycle but when I’m at home I really have no other option.

Sarah: I mean I care about the environment but I wouldn’t pay an extra whatever to recycle.

Bob: We’re college students man.

Lauren: Do you have any more comments on William & Mary? Recycling or non-recycling related?

Jake: I do think there’s a greater, I’m not saying were going better, but I do think there’s more awareness on this campus than on others. The student population in terms of their consciousness I think is a little better but at the same time if it was just more convenient then we can act on that consciousness.

Lauren: Anything else? Well thank you for coming! We really appreciate it.

Group 2 Transcription:

Lauren – We are going to go around the room and I want everyone to say their name, year and an extracurricular activity, and you can’t say basketball and I know we have a lot of basketball players in here. If you don’t have an extracurricular activity, it can be a fun fact.

JULIAN– Am I going first? Alright. I’m Julian I’m a senior, I’m a Kinies Major, and 1 fun fact about myself…

FRED - I can think of an extracurricular activity

JULIAN - I can’t use basketball.

FRED -– hum. That sucks

JULIAN– I don’t know, I guess I know a lot of interesting facts about any kind of sports… that’s kind of boring

FRED - I’m Fred, I’m a senior as well. Finance Major. My current extracurricular activity would be watching 24 on Netflix

GRANT – I’m Grant I’m a PMC History double major. I also work as a marketing intern at the Rec center and I manage their YouTube channel.

EMILY - I’m Emily, I’m a graduate student in public policy. Umm.. I guess my extracurricular activity would be I’m a graduate assistant at AidData

LUCY – Ok, I’m Lucy and I’m a senior and I’m a marketing/ Spanish double major and I’m in DG with Lauren.

BRIAN– I’m Brian and I’m a senior econ major and I met Bill Murray once in a Pizzeria.

TOM- I’m Tom, I’m a Junior and outside of basketball I lead a small group at the Williamsburg Chapel.

LAUREN– Cool, so we will start off pretty open ended, but first I just want you to tell me about your recycling habits.

JULIAN– So, we all live together and we have a bin that we sometimes use for recycling, but I wouldn’t say we actively recycle. Sometimes it gets left outside and we get to lazy to bring it into the house.

FRED - if it overflows, then we knowingly put recyclable items into the trash. Just because there is no more room.

JULIAN– Yeah.

LUCY - Do you feel guilty?

FRED -– I mean what are you going to do? If there is no more room.

LUCY – So you are a terrible person?

FRED - Yeah.. yeah

Lauren – Well, how about yourself Lucy?

LUCY– I was pretty anal in high school… like really anal. I was on the earth society, president, so I would stay after school and recycle everything. I remember coming to college, my first like, fraternity party I was just like holy shit you guys recycle

38

appendix

these solo cups, right? Everyone was like NO! Now ever since college I’ve gotten a lot more relaxed about it. I find myself finding the recycling bin full and out of convenience I knowingly guiltlessly throw things away. Ya, it’s a long walk to the recycling bin.

Lauren- (to Tom) – what about you?

TOM- Yeah, what they all said.

BRIAN– I live on campus and they have those blue bins. At first it starts as a recycling bin, but then it just becomes a generic trash bin.

EMILY - umm.. I try to recycle most things. I was also a graduate assistant for COS which is community on sustainability so its kind of something I feel like I should do. I recycle most things, but Williamsburg’s policy for recycling are pretty bad they only accept like 1 and 2 so I end up throwing away a lot of things that could be recycled if we weren’t in Williamsburg.

Lauren – Like What?

EMILY - so like a lot of the contractors that William and Mary hires only recognize bottle shaped plastics even if it’s a 1 or 2. So if its not in a bottle shape the wont recognize it. So for me its like should I put something in recycling that doesn’t look like a bottle that will be sorted our and likely tossed later.

Lauren – That’s good to know.

EMILY - yeah I recycle it just in case because I hope that maybe they will take it. Maybe a different contractor or something.

Lauren- Grant what about you?

GRANT - at home I recycled a lot. Here, though, I don’t as much because my roommates, hall mates, don’t recycle and its too much of a hassle to sort it all out to but it in an actual recycling dumpster.

Lauren- Tell me more about your recycling at home or wherever you are when you aren’t on campus.

GRANT – in general, I feel like I have a pretty good idea of what is recyclable or not. At home we have two bins one which is recycling and one that is non and I am good at sorting it there. Even if it requires extra effort like washing out a can or what have you

JULIAN– I’m from Indiana so my mom is really organized about this stuff and we aren’t organized about this stuff. So we have a newspaper bin and a plastics bin so it just keeps it separate from everything else and its just in the garage. For some reason I would

rather go to the garage and throw stuff out then when I am here I guess I’m just too lazy to go outside then bring the bin back to put the recycling in. I guess its just my mom’s not watching.

LUCY – at home we recycle everything, and like my mom, she’s really really clean and she will wash out a salsa can or a soup can, and will literally put soap in it and was it out before recycling it so our recycling is pretty spotless. Yea I got used to it in high school and I would deconstruct cardboard boxes. You fold them up and compact them to make more room… like I would just rip that box up until it was flat and tiny.

BRIAN- um at home I think my town only takes plastic and cardboard so that’s what I do. Normally we are pretty good at recycling.

TOM- yeah, my mom is pretty strict about it so like Julian said I’m probably a little better at home than I am here. We have the trash and the recycling and she always keeps it organized.

Lauren- Thinking of the typical William and Mary student What do you think their recycling habits are?

GRANT - very little, especially in all the dorms where there is the one bin they give you that says recycling inside of it… its going to be a trash bin before it’s a recycling bin.

BRIAN- I think a good amount of people recycle the bottles because there are the blue bins around campus and that seems like the most convenient way to recycle or must used recycling outlet.

TOM- I would agree with that.

LUCY - I think people recycle as much as possible, but they aren’t going to kill themselves over it or whatever or go out of their way, and um another thing is whenever people have parties there is just a ton of recyclable stuff the next morning and they toss it probably because it is convenient. There are a lot of solo cups and people done rinse and recycle them… I feel like they just use one giant trash bag.

FRED - so in order to recycle solo cups are you supposed to wash them out?

EMILY - you don’t really have to wash anything, but sometimes it will sit in a place for a while and get really nasty

Lauren- So how much do you know about recycling on campus, like what can be recycled and what can’t be recycles?

39

appendix

EMILY - I know that it costs, at least it did during orientation and they handed out these bags where it told you where you could recycle on your own so you can recycle, pens, ink cartridges, plastic bags. Pretty much anything that can be recycles, there is somewhere on campus to do it, its just there isn’t a lot of information about it for people.

BRIAN- Isn’t Swem like..

EMILY - printer cartridges, yeah they take printer cartridges.

Lauren- Where in swem though?

EMILY - Um right in the entrance there is this little box you can put them in. Batteries too.

BRIAN- I’m pretty bad about recycling batteries. It’s a good thing to do because the lithium just sits in the landfill forever.

EMILY - Definitely don’t recycle batteries the wrong way

LUCY - I had two printer cartridges on my desk the entire year last year so I was trying to figure out what to do with them so at the end of the year I just tossed them

Lauren- so what else do you know about recycling

LUCY – no much, I know its just gotta’ go in the blue bin, and I know that pizza boxes are a big no, you cant recycle that, and milk cartons you can’t recycle those, right?

EMILY - yeah, you can’t but a lot of people do.

JULIAN– so they just end up throwing it away?

EMILY - yeah essentially, its not because its cardboard because its not cardboard, well it is cardboard but it absorbs food so it will actually mess up a whole batch

LUCY - so do they throw the whole batch out? If I put a pizza box in a huge batch of perfectly clean recyclables it will not recycle anything?

EMILY - That really depends. See I’ve always wondered that and it makes me super paranoid but some contractors will just toss the whole bag if there is one bad thing, but also now days they have very modern sorting machines like they have cameras that will identify.. but that goes back to the whole bottle shape thing so they know what goes in and what doesn’t go out

Lauren- So what do you see as the main barriers?

EMILY - Personally I went to another undergrad it was… I guess you could say green in comparison and I think one of the main reasons was convenience I think all of the dorm rooms and rooms had places to recycle and access to recycling printer cartridges, batteries, pens and everything. All of the dining halls had compost vs non compost recycling and all the utensils were all recyclable so in that respect it was a lot easier for people to be conscious about it vs here.

EMILY – I know for me, I live in Jamestown and the walk for the recycling is kind of a haul so a lot of times ill just try to shove it into that little blue bin right outside but the hole is really small so I don’t know. It’s a long walk it’s a huge barrier.

JULIAN - I don’t usually recycle when im on campus when I recycle it would be if I had a coke bottle or something and I could put it in the bin but other than that I don’t know that much about WM recycling. I didn’t know you cant recycle a pizza box

LUCY - I feel like a lot of people don’t know that

FRED - yeah we consistently put pizza in the recycling… now we will have more room! For all of our other stuff

Lauren – So what kind of things do you think would make recycling more convenient?

EMILY - having the big blue bins near every door, I know I have talked to my roommate and they talk about how you can put one closer to Jamestown dorm like by the ISC and near that door. I feel like there has to be some place closer

Fred - I don’t know how much this would work but if you sent out an educational email id probably delete it and im sure lots of you guys would too and we are obviously not educated about it with the pizza boxes and milk cartons

LUCY - or do something with orientation just make it one of the meetings you have to go to. You could do one about recycling…

LUCY - or in move in they can give you a list

EMILY – I think they try but there is bureaucratic stuff that gets in the way of issues like that but I definitely agree for education on what can and can not be recycled.

LUCY– actually an obvious was would be to put a sign that says no pizza boxes, no milk

40

appendix

cartons above the recycling bins for common things that people recycle that don’t work. You could do that Lauren, just take cardboard and write on it

BRIAN - I was abroad last year and my hall had 4 bins in the kitchen, one for cans one for class and cardboard or whatever and it’s a lot of bins ya know but the school paid for it so it seemed like we knew the rules without anyone telling us what the rules were

LUCY – sometimes those bins make me mad though.. I don’t know I just want to put all my recycling in one place

FRED– I agree with that because down in the café they have those bins and I will knowingly put a can in the wrong bin because I am upset with them

LUCY – its obnoxious and annoying

FRED - Yeah

Lauren – It’s overwhelming?

LUCY – Yeah! There are like 5 different holes.

FRED– It’s confusing

JULIAN - How is it confusing?

FRED– it just shouldn’t be like that

Lauren – So what would you rather see?

FRED– Just one place to put it

LUCY – with nothing to read

FRED– A green triangle

Lauren – How could you raise awareness then?

LUCY - I think signs… orientation… maybe like shaming… “I saw that bottle go in there”

FRED - looks at coke* so it this a 2?

EMILY - um it should say on the bottom its either a 1 or a 2. That can be recycles but you cant recycle the cap and not very many people know that

LUCY – sometimes I leave the cap on and just recycle it out of laziness do you think that makes a big difference. Are they going to toss the whole batch?

EMILY - that’s the thing they aren’t going to unscrew them

JULIAN– I leave the cap on every time

LUCY – how about beer bottle caps?

EMILY – no

LUCY – Corks?

EMILY – I don’t know about corks.. some places like I went to undergrad in Philly and you can recycle aluminum there but you cant in most places in Virginia

LUCY - y aim from Richmond and I’m pretty sure we used to be able to recycle milk cartons and other boxes but recently they came out and gave everyone a letter and said they are no longer accepting milk cartons so maybe they changed contractors. That makes sense though because who wants bad milk

EMILY - yeah and its also about the wax in the carton

LAUREN– what do you guys think? It’s kinda quiet over here. (To Tom and Brian)

TOM – yeah, I honestly don’t know anything about recycling to be honest to you, all of this is new to me

LUCY – Why is he even here , I know why we are here but like…

Lauren- you don’t have to know it

LUCY – I’m along for the ride because I know you two

Lauren – Since you don’t know a lot about recycling what would help you learn?

TOM- I think what she said about the signs would help with no Pizza boxes, no milk cartons and things like that. Because ya, I had no idea

LUCY – Just have RA’s talk about it and send it out. Just like welcome back and say the rules. People would probably delete it but whatever

BRIAN – I think there are better ways to address recycling than setting everyone down to tell them, because no one listens to that stuff that much especially when you are a freshman you are taking in all sorts of other info and that just goes over your head

Lauren – what do you think would be a better avenue?

BRIAN – I don’t know I think it should just be something that is engrained and its hard to teach that maybe a less cursory approach and focus on recycling as a whole in the more vital part of

41

appendix

campus

EMILY– we could definitely try doing something like a trash sort I know places have done this where they take a normal thing of trash, take it to a public place and show people what can and cannot be recycled its more of an educational sort of thing. We used to do that as an undergrad as people walked to and from class. For 30 seconds you learn one or 2 things about recycling

LAURA – maybe do it on the terrace with a table

FRED– if President R did an educational video I’d watch it every time

Lauren – Do you see any other changes you would like to see at William and Mary?

*Silence

Lauren – think of the barriers you mentioned before and how William and Mary could help with those barriers?

GRANT – lets go back to the dorms. If they only give you one bin for recycling its going to turn into a trash bin. If they give you two bins, clearly label one make it black and put trash on the side of it and another one clearly labeled for recycling people will use them for the correct purpose

LUCY – that really funny because I have three trash cans in my room, I like to match all of my stuff

GRANT – I just feel like people forget trash bins so they just use recycling bins as trash bins.. especially in my experiences

Lauren – Do you see any other changes from William and Mary?

LUCY – Move recycling bins closer to dorms!

JULIAN– I feel like if they had recycling stations in main parts of the campus I think

LUCY– Like on my way to class if I could take out the recycling I would definitely do it

JULIAN– Maybe like 5 spots maybe that would help

Lauren – Like recycling hubs

JULIAN– Maybe that would help but I don’t know

LUCY – Like the big blue bins. The massive ones

Lauren – So how do you think that would change the behaviors of students?

LUCY– If its more convenient like on my way to class I would do it

FRED – I think that maybe, but I don’t know because I only go to a few places on campus but it seems to me that there are more trash cans than recycling bins. What if they had for every trash can they was a recycling bin? If its cold and I have to hang on to this thing Im going to just throw it away if recycling is 100 yards away so I can get rid of it. I think a 1 to 1 ratio would help draw attention to the fact that campus is trying to recycle

JULIAN– I think on campus recycling is all about the convenience. The more convenient the more people will recycle

BRIAN – I think a lot of it has to do with the dining halls like I remember my freshman year the café had a compost bin that they got rid of the next year

LUCY – I don’t think people know how to use compost bins

EMILY – I think they internally compost now because people were doing it wrong so the staff now does it

Lauren – Any other last words of wisdom

GRANT – in terms of dining halls I think the market place is much less recycling friendly I feel like I always see them taking out huge bags of trash all the time. Maybe the compost it later but I’m not sure that is always true

LUCY – now everyone has to get a disposable and there aren’t any reusable forks.

GRANT – they used to have trays but they got rid of them.

LUCY - if you sit down to eat at the market place you still will have a disposable container

GRANT - so many cups, like disposable ones

Lauren – anything else?

42

appendix

Appendix 5

43

appendix

44

appendix

45

appendix

Table 1

Table 2

46

appendix

47

appendix

Table 3

Table 4

48

appendix

Figure 5

49

appendix