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Big Clear Out at NTU

The Big Clear Out is a collaboration between the university, the students' union, and halls providers, empowering students to give back by donating their unwanted items at the end of the summer. This initiative has not only helped provide food and home essentials to those in need but has diverted tonnes of waste from landfill.

Each year, as students vacate their halls of residence, tons of unwanted clothing, kitchen items, electrical appliances, and unused food end up in landfills. To address this issue, the Big Clear Out campaign takes place, seeing collaboration between NTU Sustainability with the Community Liaison Team, UPP (our on-campus halls provider) and Nottingham Trent Student’s Union (NTSU).

Collection boxes for homewares and food are placed within halls reception areas from April to August, making it easy for students to donate while maximizing impact with minimal effort.

During the move-out periods of 2023, 2024 and 2025 this initiative successfully diverted approximately 25 tonnes of waste from landfills and incineration, all while benefiting charitable organisations. This project highlights the effectiveness of collaboration among organisations and showcases the university's collective commitment to sustainability.

Community collaboration

The scheme builds upon NTU's Community Liaison Team's ongoing collaboration with British Heart Foundation via the Pack for Good Scheme, which gathers donations for charity throughout the year on the NTU campus and in areas with high student populations. During the Big Clear Out, 12 BHF bins are set up in UPP halls at the Clifton and City campuses, along with external bins at Brackenhurst Campus. Additionally, crates for food collection are made available in the halls' reception areas.

From May to August, the initiative promotes contributions through posters, emails, the UPP ‘Homes at Halls’ app, and social media. Efficient collection is managed by charity pickups for BHF bins, with food caddies collected and donated by the NTU Sustainability team.

Sorting Donations at New Hall

The initiative has strengthened relationships between NTU, UPP, local charities, and community groups, fostering ongoing collaboration on sustainability issues. The partnership developed between NTU and UPP has led to significantly better waste communications, and term time activities such as gardening and upcycling sessions.

Himmah, a local food bank, which the majority of "Big Clear Out" food is sent to has maintained a close relationship with the NTU Sustainability team. In a reciprocal gesture, they volunteered at NTU's Foodshare allotment on Clifton Campus. A representative from Himmah said in 2023 "[This is] the biggest donation we have received, at least during my time at Himmah…The items donated were all packed into food parcels and are being distributed to those in need of emergency food support".

Dan Ward, University Account Executive, British Heart Foundation has said "The data has shown that the donation boxes in the properties have been a huge success and I would like to thank colleagues for agreeing to place the donation points and for supporting the British Heart Foundation".

Team efforts

Coordinated by the Sustainability Team, the continuing success of the Big Clear Out would not have been possible without the contributions from across the NTU community:
  • NTU Community Liaison team organising on-campus donation days with the British Heart Foundation and managing external BHF donation points in the community.
  • UPP and NTU halls staff hosting and managing indoor and outdoor collection points (indoor collections are up 600 bags 24/25 from the year previous!
  • NTU Centre for Student and Community Engagement (CenSCE) for cross coordinating their summer donation scheme for colleagues across campus libraries and delivering directly to local charities including Emmanuel House, St Ann’s Foodbank, NG11, and The Arches
  • NTU Mansfield for collecting and delivering items to the Beacon Project, supporting those facing homelessness in the Mansfield area
  • NTU Facilities team for being on hand to deliver crates and items across sites.

And of course NTU students, kindly donating their homewares and food items to the local community.

Combining the figures of the 2023, 2024 and 2025 move out periods (April through August), the Big Clear Out has so far enabled:

  • ~ 21, 000kg kg of household items donated to the British Heart Foundation.
  • ~ £30,000 worth of items donated for life-saving research.
  • ~ 3,500 kg of food donated to food banks.
  • ~ 7000 kg Co2e saved (if items were sent to landfill)
  • A saving of ~25,000 kg of waste, which would otherwise incur removal costs.
  • Strengthened relationships between our halls providers, NTU and NTSU.
  • Increased civic engagement with local charity and community partners

For the 2026 move-out period, the collaborating team's aim to engage more students and promote savings across various waste streams. This will be through contacting external accommodation providers to facilitate donations and improving donation points at Brackenhurst campus. Bedding will be donated to Dunelm’s "Textile Takeback" scheme or community housing projects, and larger items like lamps and fans will be recycled through Curry’s scheme.

The Community Liaison team will be exploring how to further encourage off campus donations from students in private rented accommodation, looking to host donation days across local areas.

NTU teams are encouraged to collaborate on this initiative and email sustainability@ntu.ac.uk with any queries.

Community partnerships at NTU

We're committed to improving outcomes for staff and students, local communities and society as a whole. We work collaboratively with many community groups, charities and not-for-profit organisations, sharing resources and expertise to make a positive difference. Find out more