On Friday, in an effort to promote sustainability, Albion College AmeriCorps and the Center for Sustainability and the Environment (CSE) hosted their annual thrift fair in the Kellogg Center (KC) living room. The thrift fair was also open on Saturday from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. with clothing items sold for $2 each.
The thrift fair is CSE and AmeriCorps Sustainability Intern and Jackson junior Alaina Shepardson’s project. At checkout, customers were given three choices of where they wanted the proceeds of their purchase to go: The CSE Green Fund, the Albion Community Garden or United Way.
Director of CSE Thomas Wilch said that giving options were expanded to give shoppers more choice in their donations.
The Green Fund, according to Wilch, is a part of the CSE gift fund account, which is set up to support sustainability class projects, as well as other student projects.
Another cause students could donate to was the Albion Community Garden.
“The Albion Community Gardens give space for community members to garden and they also grow food that is freely distributed to the community. Proceeds will help to defray costs of this work,” Wilch said.
In addition to the CSE Green Fund and Albion Community Garden, United Way was another option customers could donate to. According to the Albion-Homer United Way website, they “help make Albion and Homer stronger communities by improving education, financial stability and health.”
Jackson junior Anaka McCoy, who is also a member of AmeriCorps and CSE, helped set up the fair by sorting clothes and working the cash register.
“For the thrift fair we got a bunch of clothes from the community that are wanted or needed by the people,” McCoy said. “Doing this cuts down on fast fashion and allows us to reuse the materials we have instead of making something new and creating more waste.”
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