Pop Up at Lighten Up!

Congratulations! You have just finished your final exams. You can finally get rid of all textbooks, stuff everything into the suitcases haphazardly, and rush to the airport in the morning. When you close your eyes, throw everything about school behind, and envision your trip in another beautiful place, the school is still running. In fact, it is the busiest time for the custodial staff. As a student worker staying for summer, I saw our diligent custodial staff start working at 7 am, check and clean every dorm room and kitchen, pack all student’s unwanted items, and throw them into the dumpster until they pile up into a little mountain. You could not believe how much garbage was left by the students! But where does all the garbage go eventually? Before going to the landfill, Carleton prepares a special place for them to be reused and turning waste into wealth. And that is the Lighten Up!

What is Lighten Up?

It is an annual garage sale open to Carleton students and the whole community to create a zero-waste campus and raise funds for community partners by selling student’s unwanted items at a low price or for free. Lighten Up is led by Carleton’s Center for Community and Civic Engagement (CCCE), which is the center that supports various social justice initiatives and local non-profit organizations. It manages 2.5% of Carleton’s total waste stream by diverting 23 tons of student materials from the landfill. Last year, Lighten Up raised $28,500 for local nonprofits. 

Well, that sounds meaningful! But why is it affecting me if they are just selling reused garbage?

I personally have three reasons why Lighten Up is a must-go event. Firstly, the items sold are all carefully sorted and have reuse values so they are not counted as garbage. Secondly, they are incredibly cheap! Third, wouldn’t it be funny to see what unwanted items have been left by your friends?

I personally went to Lighten Up because I work as a summer Admissions Fellow and I attempted to dig for some Carleton clothes which I had to wear when I had to do tours. This year Lighten Up was held at the Laird Stadium. It held pre-sales during senior week for Carleton students, but I went to the session open to the public on June 19th and 20th. Although I was supposed to enter from the north end of the stadium, I accidentally entered from a door in the middle and I was surprised when five lines of donated Carleton T-shirts of various sizes appeared in front of me.

I discovered some limited versions of T-shirts which I had never seen before. For example, I got this white 2025 Homecoming T-shirt with all Carleton representative symbols on the back; a 2024-25 CS department T-shirt with texts written in code (I was wondering if these codes had a special meaning that I had not deciphered yet); and also a 2024-25 English department with words “To Bee Or Not To Bee. That Is The Question” written on it (the “be” is replaced with “bee”). I eventually grabbed six T-shirts, one pair of Carleton sunglasses, and one Carleton cap with ONLY $21!. The clothes could be worn after washing. Even if you do not wear them, it is an economical way to get some memorable souvenirs. 

Apart from Carleton clothes, you can basically buy everything here including shoes, cooking kits, decorations, rugs, textbooks, school supplies, and even TVs. A $5 dollar blender or $2 clothes would make you wonder at some point whether you are genuinely living in a capitalist country. If you walk into Lighten Up, the most common scenario is people stuffing items into their Ikea bag. In order to push for more consumption, they even release a bag sale pricing period in the last three hours, which is you can have everything packed in a bag for $15 altogether. Lighten Up is really the heaven for cheap items.

But we cannot have such a wonderful event without the hard work of all staff from Carleton and from our neighbor. I interviewed one staff member from CCCE and he said they had started working on sorting items to be sold at the end of the school day. They had to sort out garbage that could not be sold like food waste. He also mentioned that the unsold items would be recycled or donated to the local nonprofits. I also met the cashier who is a student worker from our neighbor college St. Olaf. I really want to thank all of our student workers, staff, and neighbors for the hard work they put in participating in this great event to push for a zero-waste campus and a sustainable future.

Daniel Yao (he/him/his) is a sophomore international student from Shanghai, China. He is primarily attracted to Carleton because his favorite animal is a penguin, which is also the official mascot of Carleton. He plans to major in Philosophy and Cognitive Science and he loves the trimester plan of Carleton which allows him to explore the intersection between learning science, human mind, and artificial intelligence. On campus, you can usually find Daniel working as a Chinese tutor in the Language Center (LDC), studying with friends in Sayles, or taking a walk in the Arb. When he is not in class, he likes to enjoy coffee and scones in Goodbye Blue Monday or cycle down Division St. Next fall term, Daniel will work as the student assistant  for AI at Carleton.