RECYCLOTH BLUEPRINT
As with most things, there is always room for improvement! Although our system was successful, we thought of a few ways it could be improved upon. Here are a few options for how you could take the system a step further!
Making it more clear what is happening to the clothes
Clothes collected from the theatre program's costume shop
In surveys, many students told us that they were unsure what would happen to the clothes they donated to our bins. Through our previous experiences with students’ attitudes to sustainability on campus, we know that it is very important to students that there is full transparency regarding what exactly is happening in sustainability initiatives. For example, a number of students are skeptical about whether UMD actually recycles, or if the recycling gets mixed with landfill waste. This doubt deters them from regularly recycling on campus. We want to make sure we avoid this doubt in the textile collection system by making all information about what will happen to their clothes as convenient and accessible as possible. A few ways you could accomplish this accessible transparency is through easy-to-digest visuals, clear Qr codes linking to more information, and including this information in the branding/marketing of the bins. Posters and flyers near and on the bins could inform donors efficiently through the use of visuals rather than blocks of text. Qr codes on the same flyers give donors the ability to scan and be forwarded to more in-depth information if their interest is piqued through the visuals. Finally, marketing efforts being more specific as to what the bins are for would help inform community members before they donate or see a bin in person. Rather than just saying “textile collection bin,” marketing efforts could say “clothing donation bins: clothing to be donated, recycled, and upcycled to avoid landfill.”
Making it a campus/community-wide initiative
Our project was on a bit of a smaller scale seeing as there is only so much seven full-time students can do! However, making the system into a campus/community-wide initiative could help bring more awareness to the system and therefore more clothes to the bins. We were able to get a step towards this by working with the sustainability coordinator for resident life at UMD, but by partnering with multiple campus/community-wide programs/organizations the system could have a further reach. Some options we thought of at UMD would be the Office of Sustainability, Greek Life, and student clubs focusing on sustainability. These kinds of groups can help market the bins to their circles and even possibly add incentives for their members to donate. For example, greek life chapters could give points to their members for donating to the bins.
Expanding to more convenient locations for non-residential community members
For our project, we placed bins in each on-campus residence hall and apartment building that had a lobby. This made it incredibly convenient for students on campus to donate their clothes without even leaving their buildings. However, our bins were fairly inaccessible to students not living in these buildings. Putting bins in some popular community spaces outside of residential buildings would help expand the system to community members who may not be residential. On a school campus, these could be places like libraries, dining halls, student centers, and gyms. Any community space that is easily accessible and used often by most community members would be a great option!
Figuring out why people donate
Collected clothes being given away at UMD Earthfest
In our system, we attempted to collect data on why students were donating their clothes. For example, were they donating clothing that they have had for so long and was too worn now, donating clothes that don’t fit anymore, donating clothes that they recently bought but only needed to wear once, etc? We attempted to collect this data by attaching a QR code to every bin which led to a short 1-5 minute survey. However, we did not get enough responses to the survey to create a sizable data sample. We still believe this is important data to collect and it can be done if using a different approach. One method we believe would be more successful is to create a sticker board above each bin. The board would act as a living bar graph, with the possible reasons for donating written across the x-axis. As people donate, they take stickers (that you can provide on each board) and place them in the corresponding bar for the reason(s) why they are donating. This method is just as fast as taking the short survey, but is more fun, interactive, and creates a sense of community seeing other people’s responses on the board. When partnering with departments who are allowing the placement of the bins (for example resident life for bins in residence halls), the sticker boards can be made into a contest such as “which dorm gets the most stickers on their board.” This taps into the competitive nature of donors, turning the sticker board into a game with real competition that increases the likelihood of people donating.
Make it a fundraiser
The collection bins can be a good opportunity for creating a fundraiser using some of the clothes that are collected. Collected clothes that are in good shape can be resold in pop-up shops around the community in order to raise money for a good cause, preferably a cause in line with sustainability and clothing insecurity. Rather than assigning prices to items that have been donated (and otherwise would have been thrown out), the shop can be a pay-what-you-can donation system. This way it is a more ethical way of raising money.