Everything must go—back to you

The fall move-in period is in full swing on campus, but students won’t have to go far to stock up all kinds of dorm room essentials and other items. For that, they can thank their fellow Huskies.

The sixth-annual student-run Trash2Treasure yard sale will be held in the Curry Student Center Ballroom on Sunday from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sustainability is at the heart of the yearly Welcome Week event—organizers collect unwanted but still useful items from students during the spring move-out period, put them in storage for the summer, and then sell them back to the Northeastern community in the fall at a low cost. You can follow T2T on Twitter and Facebook for more information.

Funds raised at the yard sale, which is cash only, will support student organizations on campus, according to fourth-year student and lead organizer Helen Ramsay, S/DMSB’16.

“Every year this event gets bigger and bigger,” she said.

Ramsay is on the Trash2Treasure committee within the Husky Environmental Action Team, a student-run organization focused on environmental sustainability and campus-wide carbon neutrality initiatives. HEAT launched Northeastern’s T2T program six years ago when its student leaders recognized that so many dorm items are often trashed during spring move-out. The yard sale is a way to reduce waste and educate the Northeastern community about sustainability.

So, what type of gently-used stuff will be available? Trash2Treasure will feature the annual abundance of kitchenware and dorm décor, as well as sports equipment, rugs, and various electronics. Some unique items include costumes of characters from the movie Top Gun and Michael Jackson gloves, an XBOX 360, and a set of workout equipment. In the spring, someone even donated a cactus, but it won’t be on sale Sunday; organizers figured locking it up in storage over the summer would create a prickly situation.

Said cactus was among the 15,899 pounds of donated items Trash2Treasure organizers collected from students this past spring. Non-perishable food was donated to the Greater Boston Food Bank, and clothes were given to local organizations and nonprofits. Bedding items were donated to an animal shelter. The rest—it’s yours for the shopping at Trash2Treasure.

Ramsay offered some advice for back-to-school shoppers: get there early to avoid the longer lines, though prices could drop as the event winds down. Unsold items will be donated to local community organizations or properly recycled.

“Don’t go out and buy Tupperware,” she said. “You can always get it at Trash2Treasure.”