The Green Office Catalyses Circularity Projects’ Autonomy
This semester, the Green Office cultivated the untapped potential of two previous projects. The Community Garden and the Clothing Swap Room are two of the five Circularity Projects managed by the Green Office at the Sustainability Hub, and both are thriving this year due to the enthusiastic efforts of passionate students from all UM faculties.
The Sustainability Hub, or the Hub, is a designated space at Maastricht University Tapijnkazerne for collaboration and knowledge exchange amongst many student organisations and initiatives. The Hub aims to support students who want to actively engage with one or more of our sustainability strategy pillars: Climate, Circularity, and Community. The Hub is managed by the Green Office, which also oversees the Circularity Projects housed inside and outside the building. Read more about the Hub here.
Tending the Garden
The Community Garden began slowly this past year with a handful of dedicated students constructing two plant bed boxes from wood pallets and filling them with potatoes, radishes, beetroots, and leafy greens. The original goal of the garden was to bring together UM students and Maastricht locals familiar with farming and reconnecting with nature to share their knowledge with a wider community. Since many of these original students had graduated, it was time to rebuild student interest and determine the project’s future trajectory.
On September 7th, The Green Office held a Community Garden Summer Launch to create a fresh start for a new crop of students. With a picnic, plant pot painting, and a seed bomb workshop guided by Klimaat Actie Netwerk (KAN), the event garnered nearly 60 students new and old from various faculties. We were thrilled by the turnout, as it was a fantastic sunny day for outdoor crafts and snacks. Many students had yet to learn of the Green Office, the Sustainability Hub, or the Community Garden, so this was a great opportunity to discuss the many tangible ways students can participate in sustainability initiatives at the university. And, of course, we love providing a space to make new friends.
Our new Garden Whatsapp began to grow, now with 85 students. Within a few weeks, a subset of students formed a committee with roles based on interest and previous experience - for example, some focus solely on monitoring the plants, while some want to coordinate community-centred events. Though the Green Office provides finances, supplies, and physical space for the project, students are taking charge of making the Community Garden their own. There have already been a handful of planting events adding vegetables such as winter onion, winter lettuce, lamb’s lettuce, kale, and radish, as well as a movie screening, two community dinners, and plans for two new plant beds.
In with the New Swap Room Management
The Clothing Swap Room already had moderate popularity and support. Well-known among the Sustainability Hub community, the Swap Room is a Circularity Project founded a few years ago by the Green Office team residing on the first floor of the Hub. It holds between 800-1200 articles of clothing at any given time - sweaters, t-shirts, blazers, winter coats, jeans, sneakers, handbags, scarves, etc. - on an array of clothing racks, shelves, and storage bins.
During large events in the Sustainability Hub, such as the Sustainability Festival in June and Hub Fest (previously known as OFF Day) in November, the Swap Room saw a major turnover of clothing stock. We also found success with collaborative events featuring the Swap Room, with the two Green Office x New Fashion Society (NFS) Clothing Swaps and the Green Office x Foodcoop Thrift Market garnering over 600 students altogether. We even organised “Hub Open Hours” this semester for anyone to peruse the Swap Room during designated times each week. In contrast with the Community Garden, the Swap Room has not faced issues with student engagement this year. Instead, current challenges come from a lack of substantial managerial infrastructure, especially since the Green Office student employees have limited working hours to split among our responsibilities.
In November, the Green Office gathered a group of students who had expressed interest in supporting the Swap Room through various avenues. We determined essential regulative tasks including sorting clothes, monitoring open hours, donating long-unswapped items, coordinating events, promoting stock on social media, etc., and how to divide tasks appropriately. We will soon witness this independence in action and support further development in the coming months, starting with the first extensive volunteer-based sorting event and the first Winter Clothing Swap overseen strictly by the student volunteers in early December.
We hope that the Community Garden and the Swap Room will operate under autonomous, functional organisations by this time next year, with continued support from the Green Office and the SUM2030 team.
Relevant links
Join the Community!
Community Garden WhatsApp
Swap Room Volunteers WhatsApp
Green Network WhatsApp
Contact us and get involved!
greenofficemaastricht
green-office@maastrichtuniversity.nl