Students “trash the president”
For the past three weeks, participants in Principia College’s first-ever “Trash the President” competition toted plastic buckets everywhere they went, storing in them all the trash and recyclable materials they generated. The competition, which was created and organized by all-campus eco-heads Amber Dahlin and Austin Kingsbery, earned the right to its name when President Jonathan Palmer agreed to compete against student representatives from each dorm. The competition’s goal? To generate the least trash possible.
Dahlin and Kingsbery, both sophomores, were exuberant as they discussed the event. “We wanted a competition in which the whole campus would be involved. It needed to be controlled and yet still be interesting,” said Kingsbery. They were undoubtedly successful.
Posters, located outside the dining room, tracked the progress of all participants, making it easy for community members to follow the competition. And that’s exactly what they did. Kingsbery notes, “Even people who don’t talk often [about environmental initiatives] were talking about it.” Dahlin appreciated the widespread community involvement as well: “One of the most important things has been making connections with people—dining services, facilities, Dr. Palmer, admissions. All those parties need to be involved.”
As for the results of the competition, “Dr. Palmer was fairly confident he could win,” said Kingsbery, “but he didn’t even come close.” Still, considering the fact that he doesn’t eat all his meals in a school dining room and that his office generates a lot of paperwork, the President turned in only a modest amount of trash. “I generated a lot more recycling than trash,” he noted. (If you’re curious, the President’s bucket included aluminum cans—a mark of his weakness for Fresca—paperwork, and the wrappings from a pre-packaged meal.) “I’m disappointed I didn’t trash the students,” Palmer conceded. “But I did do some trash talking,” he added jovially.
The winner, Christian Richardson (a sophomore representing Lowrey), amassed a startling amount of trash—none! “It was a little harder than I thought it would be,” he admitted. “The hardest thing was not ordering from the Pub.” (The competition required saving the used paper plates and plastic ware ubiquitous to Pub dining.)
Richardson’s prize? Two Cardinals tickets. As of now, he hasn’t decided whether he’ll go with a friend or auction off “A Date with Christian” for a Lowrey fundraiser.
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