On the Sunday before the first day of school this year, the Hanley Sustainability Institute (HSI) launched its first-ever Reuse Pop-Up event. A line of students waiting for the event to start wrapped around the Art Street Amphitheater outside the Brook Center. By the time the check-in table opened, more than 300 students were ready to dive into stations stocked with pre-loved college essentials.
The lawn was covered with almost anything a student could need, including school supplies, home decor, kitchenware, electronic appliances and furniture. Items were collected during UD’s Annual Spring Move-Out Collection. In just one hour, more than 1,200 items had found new homes, diverting nearly 1,500 pounds of waste from the landfill and providing students with dorm and home necessities for free.
Spotting the Opportunity
During the school year, I am a part of the Sustainability Student Leaders Program and a member of the Circularity Team. Our goal is to promote circular systems on campus, ultimately reducing waste. If we can provide more accessibility to students, it’s a win for everyone.
Over the course of participating in the Move-Out Collection, HSI Sustainability Student Leaders noticed that the items being donated each year were the same types of items that students were buying brand-new after moving in. This cycle of discarding and buying new again was creating unnecessary waste, contributing to overconsumption.
We identified this opportunity for reuse and decided to pilot a Reuse Pop-Up Event, funded by DuPont’s Clear into the Future grant. The event was designed to provide students with access to free college essentials, reduce their environmental impact, and foster connections with the campus community.
The Game Plan
Continuing my work as a 2025 Zero Waste summer fellow, I had a unique opportunity to help plan and bring this event to life. I wanted the Pop-Up to be an interactive experience, providing students with an easy and accessible way to engage with sustainability on campus.
We separated all the items into four categories and designed the space to resemble a farmers’ market, featuring various booths. We mapped out the layout to ensure a smooth check-in and created a tracking system that allowed students to easily check out what they were taking home, while also distributing the items among as many students as possible.
Beyond simply a waste reduction effort, we also wanted this to be a fun social event full of “UD energy.” To do so, we incorporated yard games, music, popsicles from a local small business, Sweet P’s (owned by a UD Alum), and tabling with sustainability-focused student organizations, giving students the opportunity to commit even deeper to the sustainability efforts across campus.
Impact and Students’ Testimonies
While we expected students to be interested, we were not expecting the line to form so quickly! Luckily, we had our systems in place, and as soon as 4 o’clock rolled around, students moved quickly through the booths, helping each other pick up items that would make their dorm rooms or houses feel like home. In what felt like seconds, every single item was gone.
While interviewing students who attended the event, everyone was excited about this initiative and was glad to contribute to campus sustainability.
A fourth-year student shared, “It helps everyone in the process — it helps those who left it behind and had nothing to do with it, obviously, all of us are saving a lot of money right now.”
A junior reflected on the importance of reuse, saying, “Giving items another life is always better. It's so wasteful — in this day and age, we see trash everywhere. It's always good to reuse something that can be reused.”
The event was more than just a giveaway. It built connections, encouraged sustainable habits and, most importantly, sparked important conversations about conscious consumerism.
Looking Ahead
The pilot Reuse Pop-Up proved to be a huge success, offering a glimpse of what is possible. HSI students hope to make it a UD tradition, incorporating both UD’s Move-In and Move-Out for years to come. With the success of this pilot, my peers and I hope to build a model for a permanent, on-campus thrift store, allowing the cycle of reuse to continue throughout the entire school year.
The Reuse Pop-Up Event showed how intentional actions can have a major impact. By recognizing patterns, finding solutions and prioritizing student needs, we turned a challenge into an inspiring, student-driven initiative that benefits both the campus community and the environment.
This event was everything I had hoped for, and it was great to see my summer work come to life. Watching students leave with big smiles and a sense of community was very rewarding and I’m grateful to have played a role in making it all happen.