Student employees across departments work to promote a variety of sustainable initiatives throughout Elon’s campus.
Student employees have been working to improve sustainability initiatives across campus by engaging with faculty, staff, and students across departments. From dining services to classroom lessons, students workers are the foundation for fostering sustainable engagement at Elon.
Facilities Management Waste Reduction Intern: Carolynn Christopher, ‘29
Waste Reduction Intern Carolynn Christopher works with Facilities Management to support a variety of sustainability efforts across campus. From helping maintain recycling and composting programs to creating social media content and promoting campus events, Christopher engages Elon community members in everyday sustainability practices. Through these hands-on activities, Christopher plays a part in making sustainability more accessible to all on campus while encouraging the Elon community to be more mindful of its environmental impact.
Much of this outreach takes place through experiences that connect students with campus waste reduction efforts. At a College Coffee, Christopher recently ran a table where students answered waste management trivia questions in exchange for prizes that encouraged more sustainable habits, such as reusable makeup remover cloths. Christopher also participated in a Facilities Management visit to the Greensboro Recycling Center where Elon sends its recyclable materials. This visit provided her with an opportunity to learn more about the recycling process and better understand how materials are sorted and processed after leaving campus. Experiences like these helped Christopher understand how to better communicate recycling efforts to the broader Elon community.
Elon Dining Food Waste Prevention and Diversion Intern: Casey Metcalf, ‘28
Casey Metcalf, Elon Dining’s food waste prevention and diversion intern, works alongside Elon Catering to identify opportunities to reduce food waste and promote more sustainable food practices across campus. A large part of Metcalf’s role involves analyzing data collected from catered events to better understand how much food is wasted and identify patterns that can inform future waste reduction efforts. Metcalf also attends events to observe catering operations firsthand and gain a better understanding of how food is prepared, served, and managed. Using these observations and previous data analysis, she then develops recommendations for reducing food waste, including exploring options such as reusable or to-go containers and working directly with campus event hosts to improve food planning.
One ongoing project Metcalf is working on explores the use of an anaerobic digestion system as a potential solution for managing food waste. Through this work, Metcalf has had the opportunity to learn more about the intersection of food systems and sustainability while developing practical solutions for Elon. By combining research, data analysis, and hands-on experience, Metcalf helps identify ways to make Elon’s dining services more sustainable and reduce Elon’s overall environmental impact.
Athletic Events Zero Waste Team
In October, Facilities Management hired a team of six student employees to support waste reduction efforts at athletic events. The team helps educate event attendees at certain athletic events on proper waste management by explaining where different waste belongs depending on the specific event. Waste sorting guidelines at special events can differ from those used across the general campus, and this athletic event zero waste team plays an important role in helping attendees understand how to dispose of their materials correctly.
Following some events, the team also sorts through collected waste to ensure materials have been placed in the appropriate bins. This hands-on approach helps reduce contamination in recycling and composting streams while providing students with a better understanding of waste management practices. Through both education and direct involvement, the team helps make campus events more sustainable.
The Office of Sustainability Eco-Reps
Eco-Reps are peer educators that promote campus sustainability by educating the Elon community in different ways students, faculty and staff can adopt more environmentally and socially responsible behaviors. Eco-Reps educate their peers about relevant environmental and sustainability issues through coordinating with Residence Life staff, delivering Sustainable Living lessons and promoting Office of Sustainability events. Through outreach, event promotion, and direct student involvement, Eco-Reps encourage participation in programs such as Campus Sustainability Week and Earth Week. These efforts help increase awareness of sustainability resources, highlight ongoing campus initiatives, and foster a stronger culture of environmental stewardship within the Elon community.
Through a collaboration with Residence Life, Eco-Reps work to integrate sustainability themes and practices into residential programs, identify areas of growth, and target unique behaviors within every neighborhood on campus. This team consists of eight students representing a range of majors and class years, each assigned to a specific on-campus neighborhood. In partnership with residence advisors, apartment managers, and community directors, Eco-Reps organize initiatives and events each semester that encourage student engagement with campus sustainability to promote a wide variety of sustainable living practices.
In addition to neighborhood-specific initiatives, Eco-Reps deliver Sustainable Living Lessons and Guided Sustainable Walking Tours to students through courses such as Elon 1010 and Global Studies. These lessons introduce students to practical sustainability concepts and encourage them to consider how everyday choices and behaviors contribute to broader environmental impacts. By incorporating sustainability education into the classroom, Eco-Reps help foster environmental awareness and equip students with the knowledge and tools to make more sustainable decisions in their daily lives.