Hey Skidmore Team!
Ithaca College operated a compost system on campus fro 14 years that I was involved in, we now use a local commercial composter to handle the increades volume caused by the extensive use of compostable disposables. Cornell University has a system that would work well for the types of organic materials you are composting. Have you contacted Cornell Waste Managememnt Institute (CWMI)? They can help you with the design and cost benefit information.
I would be happy to help you as well.
Peace and bio-polymers,
MD

Hi Margot,

My name is Stacey Dorn. I am the head of the composting program at Lafayette College. We are the same size as y our school and have had an extremely successful thus far. I would love to answer any questions that yall might have. You can reach me at dorns@lafayette.edu

Skidmore Team,

Penn State's University Park Campus (40,000 students) operates a composting program, OMPEC (Organic Materials Processing and Education Center) utilizing the same types of organic material. It is a cooperative effort with Office of Physical Plant, Housing and Food Services and the College of Agricultural Sciences. Here are a few links.

http://www.abe.psu.edu/extension/ompec/
http://www.opp.psu.edu/about-opp/recycling/penn-states-composting-program

Appropriate contacts would be Al Matyasovsky at OPP or Nadine Davitt in Agricultural Sciences.

Al often gives tours of the recycling/composting efforts here at Penn State.

Good Luck.

Wegmans is composting at their Organic Research Farm near Canandaigua. Finger Lakes Community College gets our recently started compost collection picked up by them weekly. Saratoga Springs might be a little far for them to come pick up yours, but I was thinking more along the lines of getting some tips from them. They are not doing anything high tech, just piles of compost. I can't recall the name of the person we worked with, but you might get more info at [Wegmans Organic Farm](http://www.wegmans.com/blog/2010/08/organic-farm/).

-Joe Varga
--The Wildlife Society Club
--The Student Senate
--The Sustainability Committee
jvarga@axp.flcc.edu

In our efforts to create a proposal for a large-scale composting system at Skidmore, we have created this questionnaire for people involved in college composting systems.

Your responses would be used as examples and to provide comparisons in our proposal, so honest stories of successes and failures will really help convince the school to start a composting system.

If you are involved in a college composting effort, we would love to hear from you!

Thanks!
Skidmore Team Compost

What type of composting system do you currently use?
How large (how many yards do you create after it is mature, how many pounds or yards do you have for inputs, what are your inputs, how large is the area of land or the building used for composting)

What type of equipment do you have? (facilities side: front end loader, tractor with bucket, special attachments for tractor, dump truck or special hauling equipment, what bins are used for hauling/storing. Dining hall side: pulper, grinder, special bins for storage, walk-in cooler for storage, etc.)

If windrows: how often do you turn your piles?

How do you store inputs (food waste, yard waste, manure) as you prepare to add to windrows?

Do you regulate storm water runoff from your compost? How?

How much did it cost to implement the system, and how long before the initial conversation started before the system was put into place? Who were the main decision-makers at your campus to make this happen?

Where did the funds come from? Where do continued maintenance and labor costs come from?

Have you conducted a food waste audit?

How did you do this?

What were your results?

How many tons of food is your school producing daily/annually?

Do you have students scrape their own plates or is it all done behind the scenes?

What type of waste do you compost and from where?

Who collects waste/manages the compost site?
Do you know the breakdown in hours for labor: hauling, turning piles, etc? Are these tasks split between different departments or different positions, or is it one full-time position?

Where does the finished compost go? How is it used?

Have you saved money since implementing the composting system, if so, how much?

How long did it take to return the initial investment?

Do you sell your compost, donate it, or use it only on campus? If you sell it, how much are you selling it for, and what legal/liability issues did you face in doing so?