Leave Green to reduce waste, need

Students are invited to help people in need in the local community while saving the environment by donating goods that they no longer need. With help from the Newman Center’s People Against Poverty program, SUNY Oswego began the Leave Green program.Leave Green encourages students to donate food, clothing and household items at Swetman Gymnasium. Food is donated to local food pantries while clothing and household items are offered in a “garage sale.” The proceeds go directly to help people in the community.

For more than 20 years, the Newman Center has been the location for the sale. One function of People Against Poverty, a committee of the Newman Center, is to have “students donate their items to us, instead of the dumpster,” longtime volunteer Kathy Brooks Nyman ’74 explained. Fellow alumna Laura Bush Angelina ’70 is also a member of the committee.

“It’s a win-win for everyone,” Director of Campus Life Richard Hughes says. “For students, it gives them somewhere to bring things they no longer have use for, and provides for someone else. It’s good for the college, because it keeps items out of the waste stream.”

The Leave Green program helps the local community and contributes to the college’s participation in climate initiatives, like the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System, or STARS; and the American College and University Presidents’ Climate Commitment, of which President Deborah F. Stanley is a signatory.

Last year, on-campus students donated items directly to the Newman Center, while off-campus students brought 900 pounds of items to the Swetman Gym.

This year, all items will be brought to the gym, sorted, weighed and sold. Items that do not sell will be donated to Catholic Charities’ St. Vincent de Paul store in Oswego. To get involved, contact richard.hughes@oswego.edu.

— Emily Longeretta ’12

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