海角大神

If you want to understand the difference between business majors and philosophy majors, consider Alex Freid.

Faced with mountains of discarded mini-fridges, rugs, and unopened food during a college move-out week 16 years ago, Mr. Freid did not see a money-making opportunity. Instead, he glimpsed a chance to help people and the planet.听

This month, as college students across the country finish classes, Mr. Freid鈥檚 campus reuse programs are redirecting tons of usable clothing, furniture, and household items to charities and thrifty students rather than to landfills.

It started back in 2010, when Mr. Freid was moving out of his University of New Hampshire dorm and into an apartment. He needed stuff, but several buddies advised him not to buy anything and wait. What he wanted would be piled on the campus's curbs in Durham, N.H., within a couple of weeks. Mass discard had become part of a nationwide annual spring ritual: students leaving scads of cast-offs on roadsides as they left after finals.

鈥淚 drove around looking for a futon, and I saw 100 of them,鈥� says Mr. Freid, who has been focused on sustainability and activism since high school. 鈥淚 realized this was a much bigger issue.鈥�

By the time he graduated in 2013, Mr. Freid had advised a handful of schools and turned his side-hustle into a national nonprofit: the Post-Landfill Action Network.听

PLAN creates school-run, student-led, zero-waste initiatives designed to operate on any kind of campus and to continue after their founders graduate. Mr. Freid says PLAN has worked with some 200 schools throughout the country.听

Tina Woolston, the director of Tufts University鈥檚 Office of Sustainability, says green move-outs are labor-intensive, require coordination among university departments, and can take months of preparation. She says Mr. Freid is the go-to when schools want to develop a green move-out. (Tufts has consulted with PLAN previously.)听

鈥�Using that resource and their tool kit is incredibly valuable,鈥欌�� she says.

Even after Mr. Freid launched the network, he has remained hands-on at UNH.听The day after graduation last week, he and a handful of students and UNH staff collected discards for the school鈥檚 15th August tag sale. Their landing zone was a crowded but orderly rec room in one of the campus鈥檚 redbrick dorms.

Americans鈥� abundance of stuff traces back to the era after World War II, but its throw-away mindset听shifted into high gear about 20 years ago. Fueled by cheap goods, fast delivery, and trendy social media videos, dorm decor in particular has become an arms race that restarts each summer when the newest aesthetic showdown kicks in. And every May, the cast-offs swell.听

Hillary Chura

Volunteers and staff spend about 600 hours collecting and sorting items left by students departing for the summer, at the University of New Hampshire in Durham, May 17, 2026. The discarded items include books, kitchen appliances, furniture, lamps, dishes, toys, and costumes. Items are tested to make sure they work, cleaned, put into storage, and priced for sale when students return to campus.

鈥淭he biggest issue is that material things these days have very little value to young people,鈥� says Halina Brown, professor of environmental science and policy at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts.听鈥淥ur whole culture is buy, use it for a while, and throw it away. We are a throw-away consumer society.鈥�

College students departing for the summer have long schlepped home items for use next year or stored them nearby. Sometimes, logistics challenges intervene. Even for those inclined to reuse, they might live too far to take much home 鈥� and it is impractical to pack up a Star Wars comforter to park in a costly storage unit.听

At Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, for example, 75% of students are from out of state, and most have no economical way to store items for the next year, says Stephanie Corbett, senior director of energy and sustainability.听

So, 15 years ago, administrators started an end-of-year recycling donation drive.听

鈥淭he amount headed to landfill when it was perfectly good was heartbreaking,鈥� Ms. Corbett says. 鈥淭hose aren鈥檛 family heirlooms that people hand down,鈥� but they can help Clevelanders in need.听

Regardless of why the discards mount, many schools and students want to tame the beast.听听

Like Case Western, some are turning to organized recycling, known as green move-outs or dump-and-runs. Initiatives vary by school. Some are university-backed; others are student-run projects. Who gets the booty varies as well. Some donate items to charities such as Goodwill; others give them to next year鈥檚 students. Most have tag sales where students can buy items at drastically reduced prices, with proceeds going back into a school's program, Mr. Freid says.

At UNH that spring in 2010, Mr. Freid and friends collected about 20 tons of cast-offs. He had coordinated with administrators, who provided storage space and support for the school鈥檚 Trash 2 Treasure program. In their first T2T yard sale the next August, receipts for the thrifted goods totaled $12,000.听

Now, PLAN has nine employees in five states advising colleges. Its 58-page ""听is free.

Mr. Freid estimates that about half the country鈥檚 have donate-and-rehouse programs, with more coming online. Early adopters include Boston-area Tufts, where a student started collections in 听New York University launched its first large-scale green move-out in and has a free Swap Shop. Boston University began in .

Mr. Freid also helped the University of Massachusetts Amherst launch New2U in 2012. It began with one dorm and now covers all of the school's 52 dorms and 15,000 residents. Its one-day tag-sale on move-in weekend attracts up to 5,000 shoppers perusing discounted microwaves, refrigerators, furniture, clothing, and electronics, says Ezra Small, the school鈥檚 sustainability manager. It brings in upward of $20,000, which is reinvested in the program.听

鈥淲e are an institution that thinks about how sustainable we are, but our move-out process was not sustainable,鈥� Mr. Small says. 鈥淲e were throwing out so many things, filling so many dumpsters.鈥�

Like many of PLAN鈥檚 members, UMass Amherst expanded New2U beyond its initial mandate. It now offers a (mostly) year-round thrift store for residents, and partners with groups that recycle fabric and mattress toppers that cannot be resold. Mr. Small estimates the school has diverted more than 100,000 pounds from landfills. He doubts New2U would be where it is without Mr. Freid.

鈥淗e is a huge central part to our origin story,鈥� Mr. Small says. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 know without his inspiration that we鈥檇 have ever started it.鈥�

In 2020, Mr. Freid transitioned from PLAN鈥檚 co-executive director to director of its Atlas fellowship program to focus on mentorship.听

As with UNH, UMass Amherst鈥檚 green move-out initiative has become part of the school鈥檚 ethos. But it鈥檚 more than that.听

鈥淭he most important thing is training students to have an impact and make a difference on campus and in society,鈥� Mr. Small says. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 their biggest value.鈥�