Video: Fraternity Looks at Smoking on Campus - No Butts About It

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Kent State University has a problem with butts - cigarette butts, that is, littering the campus. Beta Alpha Psi, the honorary fraternity for accounting, finance and information systems majors, recognized the problem and did something about it.

A smoker stands in front of a "smoker's outpost," or cigarette butt receptacle, on the Kent Campus. Photo by Jeff Glidden

The organization started the “Butt Awareness” project to draw attention to the litter problem caused by smoking on campus. In particular, the students determined how much time and money Kent State spends each year on cigarette butt removal.

In March, the organization competed against eight other schools to win the Community Service Best Practices category at the Beta Alpha Psi regional meeting in Chicago. The prize was $500 for the group and a chance to compete at the national level in San Francisco in August.

The Butt Awareness project was sparked when a Beta Alpha Psi member suggested selling cigarettes on campus as a fundraiser. He had noticed that a lot of students smoked and thought it would be a sure-fire way to raise money. The fundraiser was a no-go, but it did get members thinking about smoking at the university.

From the beginning, the student members recognized the different views on smoking and decided to focus on awareness rather than getting people to quit.

“Accounting is not about telling people what to do,” says Donald McFall, Beta Alpha Psi advisor and lecturer in the College of Business Administration and Graduate School of Management. “We gather, measure and identify information so that people can make rational decisions.”

The information gathering began on what the students called “Butt Seek Saturday.” Members searched around the academic buildings on campus and documented areas with discarded cigarette butts.

“Our ultimate goal was to mimic the butt collection processes of Kent State’s custodial service workers,” says Mary Cowyx, Beta Alpha Psi member. “Before we could begin the actual butt collection, we needed to get a good idea of where to locate them.”

The next phase was “Butt Sweep Saturday.” Eight members collected cigarette butts for two hours. “It was thoroughly disgusting,” says Steve Kessen. The members cleaned out trash receptacles, dug through mulched flower beds and swept up sidewalks. In all, they collected 12,150 cigarette butts.

“We knew cigarette butts were a major problem around the first floor [of the Business Administration Building], but hadn’t paid much attention across campus,” McFall says. “It was eye-opening and downright disgusting.”

After sweeping away the butts, the members calculated the results. According to their estimates, Kent State spends approximately 5,200 hours and $70,200 picking up an estimated 4,000,000 cigarette butts each year.

“The numbers were astonishing,” Kessen says. “It’s hard to believe that much money is spent cleaning up butts on campus and how many [cigarettes] are smoked.”

One of the Beta Alpha Psi members, Bob Gross, a smoker, says the project made him rethink his views on smoking. “Every time I go to throw a butt on the ground, I think I should throw it away and then I think maybe I should just stop,” he says. “It has encouraged me to reevaluate quitting. Eventually it could work.”

Beta Alpha Psi’s recent success adds to its winning tradition. In only the fifth year of Best Practices competition, the Kent State chapter has won regionally in all three categories - community service, professional and innovation.

Click here to watch the video.

-Michelle Sands