sustainability | North Central College

Earth Day kicks off weeklong activities April 22-26

North Central College will recognize Earth Day, held worldwide every year on April 22 and involving more than 1 billion people, with a series of activities Monday through Saturday, April 22-26. Activities include educational discussions, documentary screening, tree planting and service project.

Monday April 22, noon-2 p.m.
Kaufman Dining Hall

Sustainability news: ways to protect and conserve groundwater

North Central College supports and encourages core sustainability values and actions in all aspects of campus life. Protect Your Groundwater Day on Tuesday, Sept. 11, is an annual recognition day promoted by the National Ground Water Association.

Sustainability Coordinator Brittany Graham says groundwater protection can be broken down into two categories—protection and conservation—and we can each take positive action in both areas.

Earth Day events, April 24 and 26

To celebrate Earth Day, which officially falls on Sunday, April 22, the student club Green Scene will host two “green” events on April 24 and 26. Both campus events are free and open to all students, faculty and staff.

College installs new bike racks

A recent bike audit determined that in addition to the 150 red bikes on campus, an additional 191 personal bikes are being used on campus. To increase parking locations for these bikes, staff in the maintenance department recently installed bike racks at the front entrance of Merner Field House, Student Village, Championship Plaza, and Kimmel, Seybert and Schneller residence halls. Soon, racks will be installed near Carnegie Hall. These new locations are in addition to the bike racks installed at Seager and Rall residence halls this summer.

Green Cleaning system gives new life to old things

This fall North Central College announced it was shifting to a Green Cleaning system. This change brought not only new cleaning products that use fewer chemicals, but also new dispensers to accommodate eco-friendly products. All old cleaning products and dispensers around campus were removed and replaced with new greener products and dispensers.

College receives grant to start composting program fall term

North Central College was awarded a grant through the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity Illinois Food Scrap Composting grants program to begin a composting program in Kaufman Dining Hall.

Carpet from Kroehler Field is repurposed, recycled

As work on the Kroehler Field resurfacing project in Benedetti-Wehrli Stadium continues, the College has arranged for the disposal of the rubber field or “carpet” that was removed. FieldTurf Corporation, the company installing and supplying the new field, has told North Central it will try to either recycle or reuse the removed carpet. In addition, a percentage of the carpet has been repurposed by the Cardinal baseball team for several batting practice locations.

Campus garden is classroom for local culinary students

Twelve high school students and two instructors from the Culinary, Pastry Arts and Hospitality Management Program of the Technology Center of DuPage visited North Central College as part of a field trip on May 6 to get a behind-the-scenes look at the campus garden program and dining services.

Students help compost 620 lbs. of food waste

For three days last week in Kaufman Dining Hall, members of SGA performed a food audit during the all three meal periods. They advised students to scrape their food waste into red tubs and take a guess of how much food they thought would be thrown out over the three-day period.

Bobby Mette ’14 won the contest with a guess of 617 pounds, which came closest to the actual 620 pounds of food. The food waste was not only deferred from a landfill, but will be used to create composting materials for rooftop gardens and landscaping.

SGA gets hands dirty in dining hall waste audit

Members of the Student Governing Association (SGA) will be getting their hands dirty next Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, Feb. 22-24, in Kaufman Dining Hall while performing a food waste audit during meal times. They’ll be stationed in the plate return area of the dining hall to help scrape plates and communicate information about a composting program to other students. The food waste they gather will be weighed and the data used to advance the possibility of composting the College’s food waste. During those three days all the food waste from Kaufman will be composted.