Zero Waste Move-Out

Our effort to make Rhodes a more sustainable campus starts with you! This move-out season, help us out by sorting your Waste, Recycle, & Donation items separately at assorted locations in each residence hall. Your actions mean more than just reducing waste going into landfills: these donated items will be distributed to those in need in surrounding communities in Memphis. We are sincerely thankful for your support!

We need your help! Sign up here to volunteer for a one-hour shift in your residence hall!

Did you know . . . 

A debris field the size of Texas has formed in the center of the North Pacific Ocean. Called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, it is composed mainly of microscopic Styrofoam particles and tiny pieces of degraded plastic. The millions of pounds of garbage in the patch are stuck in the clockwise gyre that swirls endlessly in the vast North Pacific basin, leading to the coinage of a new term: “trash vortex.” The garbage field is growing, going nowhere, and taking the shape of things to come. Since the sudden in- flux of millions of tons of Japanese tsunami and marine debris in March 2011, a second trash vortex has formed in the western Pacific Ocean. A three-year study published in March 2017 showed that the original garbage patch had grown to cover 1.6 million square miles, double the size of Texas, triple that of France, and sixteen times greater than previous estimates. (Moore 2020, 486)

Moore, Charles. 2020. “The First Trash Vortex.” In The Ocean Reader: History, Culture, and Politics, edited by Paul Roorda, 486–493. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.