As if finals and graduation were not enough to keep University of Colorado senior Richard Levy busy this week, he is also packing and moving out of his house on the Hill.
Levy, graduating Friday, is moving in with his parents until he finds a job.
Now, Levy and his three roommates have to figure out what to do with all their stuff.
“We bought most of the furniture together, so it’s not worth selling it and dividing out like $7 each for what we’ll get,” Levy said.
So, the four seniors decided to give back to their community.
This week, Levy said he will dump a table and chairs, two couches and a 42-inch flatscreen television in the alleyway behind his house.
It’s not that he is lazy — Levy said it’s tradition for seniors to return the favor.
“I got my desk and chair that I’m still using now in an alleyway,” Levy said. “We’re just paying our dues.”
Levy may be able to get away with shoveling his unwanted goods on a Hill sidewalk, but students moving out of the residence halls are being asked to donate their usable items.
There is just one day left before the dorms close for the summer, and students are rushing to move out. Many of them aren’t taking everything along.
“I’ll be throwing away pretty much everything hanging on my walls,” said CU freshman Hannah Guerrero. “There are some things I don’t need to keep, and it’s not worth packing them, so I’ll just get rid of some stuff.”
The CU Environmental Center is encouraging on-campus students to recycle their unwanted, reusable items in bins located in the residence hall lobbies. There are bins for usable items like furniture, clothes and shoes and separate bins for non-perishable foods and personal items.
Much of the discarded items will benefit the Boulder County Homeless Shelter and US Again — a non-profit that disperses unwanted items to those in need.
The ECenter is also expanding its reusable campaign by selling the items from bins in Williams Village at a garage sale May 14 to benefit the Boulder Valley School District.
And while CU Police continue to monitor the more popular recycling technique of dumpster diving, the ECenter is using campus Dumpsters to expand their reusable items program, said Dan Baril, Recycling Program manger for the ECenter.
“We put bins at three of the Dumpsters, hoping to give students one last chance to recycle their items instead of trash them,” Baril said.
CU Police Cmdr. Tim McGraw said the police crackdown is not only out of safety concerns for the danger of being inside a Dumpster, but non-university affiliated divers, in search of items, causes a distraction on campus.
He also said the department wants to support recycling efforts by the ECenter.
“We gave warnings last year, but the potential for tickets will be more in play this year than in prior years,” McGraw said.
John Fox, assistant director of Housing for CU, said out-of-state students often struggle with transporting their items home, due to air travel, while in-state students typically have an easier time, with the help of family and a short car trip.
About 41 percent of the students in the dorms are out of state.
Some students are forced to rent storage units to house their items until they return in the fall.
Van Vasquez, manager at AAA Storage, said about 300 students rent units around this time every year.
A small unit, typical for freshman with little or no furniture, costs around $100 for the summer, while upperclassmen who need more space are looking at around $180, Vasquez said.
CU freshman Will Mckenna said he found a friend with some extra storage space in Boulder for a fair price: Free.
“I’m going home but I can’t take everything so I’ll leave most of it here and then just move it to my new place in August,” Mckenna said.
