The seventh annual RecycleMania competition drew to a close Saturday, and for the third consecutive year, Brown fell in the middle of the pack. A week before the competition ended, the University stood at 49th out of 77 colleges in the top category.
Brown, which competed in the Grand Champion category, as well as several others, had a cumulative recycling rate of 20.09 percent as of last week. By contrast, the top-ranked California State University, San Marcos, had a cumulative recycling rate of 58.57 percent. The final results have not yet been reported.
While Brown's performance may seem lackluster, those involved with the University's RecycleMania campaign are optimistic.
"Of the 200 schools in (the Per Capita Classic) category, the fact that we're around 50 - in the top quarter of these schools - I think that that speaks well of the program here," said Resource Efficiency Manager Kurt Teichert, who works closely with the event's student organizers.
Director of Custodial Services Donna Butler was similarly positive and wrote in an e-mail to The Herald that students are increasingly aware of RecycleMania.
The results were not a surprise for student organizer Kevin O'Brien '09, who said he expected Brown to rank in the middle of schools competing. "While I would like to see Brown do better, I ... sleep well at night knowing that Brown didn't fluff up its measurements," he wrote in an e-mail to The Herald. "Brown prides itself on the use of curbside weighing and accurate measurements of recycling data."
By comparison, some schools 'estimate' their recycling quantities.
Though schools' success is measured by the quantities recycled in eight different categories, colleges' existing recycling programs can sometimes hurt their standing in the competition by reducing the amount of initial waste created.
"Here at Brown with things like the (PAW Prints) system, we know for a fact that once we introduce that kind of system, the amount of paper we're using - and therefore putting in recycling containers - is reduced considerably," Teichert said.
"That's one of the challenges of this contest," he added. "It's always kind of a mixed message."
Schools' rankings can be largely determined by the enthusiasm and commitment of their RecycleMania teams - not all of which are student-run, said Ed Newman, recycling and refuse manager at Ohio University and one of the creators of the original RecycleMania contest back in 2001.
Rutgers' solid performance, for example, was not a surprise, Newman said. Rutgers has a year-round recycling program with a paid coordinator. "They have a really good program, and they've been doing it for a long time, so they've probably just been improving over the years," he said.
Schools in states with stringent recycling standards, such as California and New Jersey, may also have an advantage, Teichert said.
Brown could improve its future RecycleMania standings by focusing on waste diversion, Teichert said, but he added that "a whole series of incremental changes" rather than one single change, are necessary to improve the University's results.
Others suggested Brown's poor ranking would improve if RecycleMania's categories were defined differently.
"I would like to see a new category created or some sort of distinction made for schools who actually use curbside weights rather than 'estimations,' " O'Brien wrote.
As the RecycleMania competition has grown and acquired widespread attention and corporate sponsors, Newman said, it has also lost some of the original intimacy.
Still, he said, despite the program's flaws, it's important to keep sight of the contest's real mission.
"The bottom line is that we're trying to get more recycling at our schools," Newman said. "If the motivation is rivalry among schools, then it's doing its job."
"I do think that it's exciting that Brown is able to participate," Teichert said, adding that RecycleMania is "just a way to make this fun."
The final RecycleMania rankings will be announced April 16.
