In 1995, Real McCoy topped the charts, scrunchies were all the rage and Penn was recycling at a rate of 27.5 percent of its waste.
But, just as neon spandex seems to have disappeared from the current popular fashion scene, recycling, too, seems to have faded into the background for many Penn students.
"Issues of recycling used to be very prevalent ... in the early '90s -- it seems to have dropped off the radar," Penn Environmental Group Co-Chairman Jon Baker says. "Environmental recycling concerns have been lost on a large part of the student body."
Baker is not alone in his frustration with current recycling rates -- which were last recorded at 20.1 percent in 2002. Officials at Penn, and at peer institutions like Yale University, are currently struggling with the dual task of increasing awareness on campus and simultaneously convincing students that their individual actions do make a difference.
"The majority [of students] will recycle if it's convenient -- if they're given information on how to do it [and] if they're given a reason for why it's important," says Yale recycling coordinator C.J. May.
And though Penn's Urban Park Manager Kris Kealey says that "the fraternities are very friendly on Locust Walk -- they bring their beer bottles down after the weekend," she still highlights the fact that Penn's recycling rates are "stabilized at a certain point" and seem a bit resistant to change.
Several factors may hinder the process of what May describes as improving "university attitudes." One concern is that recycling does not in fact help the environment, but rather may do more damage than good.
"Naysayers argue that you have to run an extra truck," which adds to pollution, May says of those who disagree with his mission. Those critical of recycling also say that the cleaning methods used at recycling plants waste valuable water and chemicals.
However, avid supporters of recycling insist that it is a beneficial process.
"You're losing less water and chemicals to take old paper and turn it into new paper" than to start from scratch, May says.
Baker agrees that energy is actually conserved by recycling.
"The energy used to melt an aluminum can and make it into a new aluminum can is going to be much less than the energy that it takes to mine a raw material" to produce a brand-new can, the College sophomore says.
Baker stresses that the benefits of recycling are not just contained within the environmental realm; rather, there are economic benefits to be obtained as well.
"Economically, it is within the University's interest to recycle," he says. "It costs them at least twice the amount to get rid of trash than to get rid of recycling."
May sees the economic effects of recycling in more abstract terms.
"The true economic benefit is one that shows up on nobody's books -- not even Yale's," he says, referring to a reduced amount of greenhouse gasses, emissions and "dependence on foreign oil." According to May, universities are "helping the global economy" by recycling.
Even if students are convinced that recycling is a positive innovation, many are still suspicious about the University's devotion to actually following through with the recycling process.
Some point out that there is no guarantee that the soda bottle they drop in a campus recycling bin ever actually makes it to the off-site processing facility at 52nd Street and Woodland Avenue.
"We have had some folks use that as an excuse for not taking part in the [recycling] program," May says of his experiences at Yale.
He recalls instances where material in recycling bins has been incorrectly disposed of along with trash.
I "need to be vigilant," May says of his efforts to ensure that recycling is done properly. "You have to be Sherlock Holmes."
May says that most of the reports of inappropriate waste sorting stem from observation of the housekeeping staff.
Kealey says she experiences similar scenarios at Penn.
"The biggest complaint I've heard is that [people] feel that the housekeepers are not recycling," she says, reporting that allegations pop up approximately twice a month.
"I think that there's a perception out there that [recycling] is not getting done," Kealey adds.
She cites the "big turnover" that the housekeeping staff continually experiences as a hindrance to recycling consistency.
May says that he thinks "a lot of education needs to be done" with regard to the housekeeping staff to ensure that they understand the importance of separating trash and recyclables.
Both Penn and Yale have been introducing new tactics to try to improve dwindling recycling rates.
"The new triple barrels are out and about," Baker says, referring to the 20 joint recycling and trash cans -- with slots shaped specifically for paper, trash or cans and bottles -- which have recently made their debut on campus.
Penn is "trying to take away the contamination aspect, which has kind of hampered efforts to get recycling up in the past," Baker says. If more than approximately 20 percent of what is in a recycling barrel contains trash, the entire barrel must be thrown away.
"The places that are recycling can pick out isolated pieces of trash," Baker says, adding that "at a certain point where profit margins are so thin, it's not cost-effective for them to spend all their time sorting out trash and recyclables."
Baker hopes that the triple barrels will help to decrease contamination rates.
At Yale, both students and officials have taken a different approach to improve their school's recycling rates, which fluctuate between 13 percent and 18 percent.
With the help of Yale Utilities, the Yale Student Environmental Coalition has drawn on competition in an effort to motivate students.
Since the spring of 1991, Yale's 12 residential colleges have been engaged in the battle for the Green Cup -- "a glass trophy cup ... [made] from glass collected from student recycling bins," according to the Yale recycling Web site. The cup is awarded to the residential college that collects the most recycling for the year.
Cash prizes are also distributed weekly and yearly as an incentive.
But back in Philadelphia, Kealey is feeling the monetary crunch of improving Penn's recycling program.
"When [recycling] first became a law, we really put in a big effort money-wise," she says. "Over the years, it's become [a situation where] you just kind of do it based on what you have."
"You don't get financing for it for the most part because there are more important things" to which the University delegates money, Kealey adds.
Kealey says she sees an increased effort as necessary to the success of the University's recycling program.
"We're kind of stagnant right now. We need to put another push out there," she says.
And May wants to see a shift in the everyday routines of students.
"What we really need now is a change of attitude -- we need people to think of recycling as a normal part of life."
