Students have been turning Ole Miss Dining scraps into nutrient-rich soil since September 2013 through composting with the help of a $3,000 UM Green Fund Grant and the Office of Sustainability.
Funding for the project was obtained in April 2013 by senior parks and recreation management major Victoria Burgos. A five-member team manages the project. Each member holds an individual job in the office while taking turns doing the physical labor of composting, which takes one or two hours every day.
The UM Composting Program composted more than 30,000 pounds of pre-consumer food waste during the 2014-2015 academic year, according to the program’s website. Environmental analysis conducted by a Civil Engineering 471 class found that the composting efforts from the 2013-2014 academic year reduced the campus greenhouse gas emissions by more than 8 million tons.
Senior international studies major Steven Wild has been composting for only three weeks, but has a passion for making the University of Mississippi campus more sustainable. Wild works to research additional funding opportunities for the composting project.While studying abroad in Germany last year, Wild heard about the project and became interested in the sustainability efforts he saw abroad.
“I was inspired by the widespread sustainability efforts of the Germans,” Wild said. “There’s much more of a public consciousness about sustainability. It’s talked about more there than here in Mississippi.”
Wild applied and interviewed for an internship with Ole Miss Composting through the department of sustainability.
The team receives buckets of compostable material comprises fruit and vegetable scraps from various locations including the Rebel Market, The Grill at 1810, Freshii and Ole Miss Catering.
The buckets are taken to the Maynard W. Quimby Medicinal Plant Garden, where there are three composting stalls. The organic material is deposited and covered with dry material to speed up decomposition and protect the scraps from insects and animals.
The UM Composting Program created over 19 cubic yards of compost in its first academic year of existence.
The finished compost is donated to the Garden Club and the Oxford Community Garden. The faculty advisory committee and volunteers also take personal amounts of compost for their own use.
Sophomore integrated marketing and communications major Angie Jordan, who has been with the team for just under a month, is in charge of the social media efforts for the project.0
“It’s actually a harder job than I thought it would be,” Jordan said. “It’s difficult to come up with posts that no one has used yet.”
The project falls under the control of the Office of Sustainability located on the third floor of the Lyceum, but is mostly student-run.
Victoria Burgos, who started the project in 2013, has been committed to the cause ever since. Even knee-deep in compost, Burgos and Jordan were smiling and cracking jokes about the work they were doing. After the 2015-2016 school year, Jordan will be the only remaining student involved in the project.
“I love working with people who get pumped about it.” Burgos said.
