This school year is the beginning of the Fill It Forward program on campus. Hamilton is attempting to progress sustainability efforts with donations and reusable containers as the community engages with the program. The center of the conversation is around the lack of paper cups. Sustainability Coordinator Jessie Paradis-Stern ’26 shared that Hamilton was using and throwing away about 2200 paper cups daily. This was costly and caused environmental damage, as paper cups take a long time to degrade. A Commons Parkhurst employee reports that the cups are about $0.09 each, with a total amount spent on cups at around $45,000, in addition to approximately $50,000 more to handle the landfill waste.

This summer, sustainability interns worked with Parkhurst and sustainability teams to look at companies and solutions to creatively address campus sustainability needs. Paradis-Stern said that the Parkhurst employees were very open to the new program and being taught how it works. The Fill it Forward program has officially been launched on campus and there have been a variety of reactions, both from students and employees.

Fill it Forward was a program chosen to streamline the sustainability process, according to Paradis-Stern. The program works through an app available on phones, making it more convenient for college students. The previous method of handing in lanyards when returning a container posed difficulties: they were lost, not returned, and tracking the return of containers was difficult. Now, all employees and students can use the Fill it Forward app in order to scan into the program. Paradis-Stern also mentions that every time a community member scans into the program, Fill it Forward donates $0.02 to one of the organizations they are partnered with. With the number of people that scan in and out every day, the community contributes to donating to other important causes in addition to initiating new sustainability efforts.

A Commons Parkhurst employee said that “at the beginning, the students were pretty hesitant. I feel like now they have gotten used to it.” She said that after the first few times people scanned the QR codes on the containers with the Fill it Forwardʼs borrowing process, “it is actually seamless and an easy process.” The McEwen employee said that she personally has mixed feelings about the new program. “I like the program because of the QR codes, which makes it easy to keep track of the boxes and cups,” she said. On the other hand, she shared, “I don’t like it because of the cups. Instead of replacing the paper cups with ceramic mugs for the dining halls and adding the to-go cups, it’s just the to-go cups, which means more cups are being taken out and not returned when they should.” Moreover, she explained that there can be struggles with students using the app; she followed up by mentioning that students do prefer the app because it is easier. She said that she sees differing opinions on the program based on how often students use it, consistent with comments from the Commons employee. However, the McEwen employee said that she doesn’t like the program because the paper cups were removed, but ceramic mugs were not put in their place for use within the dining hall. She said that now more cups are being taken out and not returned and says this is part of the issue. She said that she also hears students saying that they still want paper cups back.

Now, in collaboration with Administrative Services and Parkhurst, the sustainability office and coordinators were able to open the campus up to the new sustainability efforts, explains Sara Soika, the Environmental Health & Safety Specialist within Hamilton’s Sustainability Working Group (SWG). The Fill it Forward app is able to supply students with reusable to-go containers and reusable mugs with the goal of reducing the reliance on single use materials by making access to reusable products easier.