Survey Progress

Within 5 minutes of sending out the Eco-Clamshell program surveys, I have already received 10 responses! This immediate response speaks to the passion Oxy students have for sustainability, and more generally, their desire to be involved in projects that seek to improve current systems. I am very pleased at the responsiveness I have seen thus far and hope that it will continue. As I await the return of the surveys, I will be designing interview questions to ask the campus dining staff as a way to evaluate the program from a different perspective. I have not identified any significant problems with the campus dining's role in the program, but hope to confirm this assumption by interviewing cashiers, servers, and a few of the Market Place overseers. These three sets of interviews should be fairly short, but will ensure that each arm of the container process is running smoothly and efficiently. I have also been thinking about the need for promotional materials and instructions on the container program in the Market Place. I would ultimately like to design a large poster that outlines the instructions for using the container that can sit either by the cashiers or by homestyle. I think a poster like this will help remind program enrollees of the process, which will help the program run more smoothly on a day to day basis, but will also serve as a promotion for the program.

My goals for the remaining five weeks are as follows:

- Interview campus dining staff

- Analyse surveys

- Create promotional poster

- Generate a report for campus dining based on the surveys and interviews that gives a detailed outline of all of the identified problems with the program. In the report I will also makes suggestions on how we can fix the problems, drawing improvements from container programs at other colleges.

Survey Questions and Problems

I have been working on drafting survey questions this week and have come across some issues with the program that have emerged the longer the program has been operating. One of the main issues I have identified is the problem with rinsing the container before returning it to the Market Place. Dorms have kitchen sinks, but they don't have garbage disposals to remove the left over food, resulting in a build up of old food clogging the drains. Even worse, some students are rinsing their containers in the bathroom sinks, whose drains aren't even large enough to allow the food to go down the drain. This is putting strain on the cleaning staff who is forced to pick old food out of the drains on a weekly basis.

There is one clear solution to this problem: having students take their container to the cashier to get a token, and then dropping their container on the conveyor belt to be rinsed and washed by dining hall staff. There is one main problem with this solution. The program is still limited to a certain number of people, and under this system we cannot be sure that non enrolled students will not use other members' "returned" containers to get a token for themselves. As soon as the program is open to the whole campus, this new system will be an easy fix to eliminate the need to rinse containers before returning them.

As I am drafting the surveys, I am asking questions about problems that people have and possible solutions they have come up with to solve these issues. I expect to analyse the surveys in 2 weeks.

Program Evaluation

This week I have been researching Eco-Clamshell programs at different schools to investigate how they implemented the program. I stumbled upon a report created by Audrey Copeland, an alumna of Eckerd College who invented the Eco-Clamshell. She created this report to help other schools set up Eco-Clamshell programs at other school. She outlines 5 key steps in the process of implementing the program: Meet with Key Individuals, Choose a System of Accountability, Purchase Containers, Implement and Grow Program, and Evaluate Program (Audrey Copeland, "Eco-Clamshell Handbook" 2009). We have successfully completed all of the steps except for evaluation, which is my next plan of action. I have decided to create three different surveys and do face-to-face interviews. One survey will be for current members. One will be for people who were accepted into the program but never enrolled, and one will be for people who never signed up. The goal of this survey is to get input from people inside and outside of the program. I hope to receive information on how we can improve the program, what we are doing well on, and how we can make the program more attractive to those not currently involved. I will conduct interviews with the dining hall staff to see if there are any problems, concerns, or suggestions on how to make the program more effective from their side.

Waiting List Update

We accepted 28 new people into the Eco-Clamshell pilot program yesterday for a total of 163 active members! We currently own 480 Eco-clamshell containers but only have 360 in circulation, so we can continue to add people to the program. The current ratio of approximately 2 containers per person seems to be working very well and we haven't had any problems with shortages. One issue we have heard about as the program has progressed is people losing their tokens. The tokens must be carried individually and there is no way to clip them onto a key ring, etc. We are looking into having facilities drill holes in them so people can put them on a ring. The problem has come up a few times but does not seem to be a detrimental problem to the program as a whole. Again, Amy and I have checked in with the cashiers and servers to see how they are managing with the new system and everything seems to be fine! Continue to follow progress on our Facebook page!