Keep Iowa State Beautiful is an environmentally friendly student and faculty committee with one main goal in mind: encouraging people to get their trash into trash cans.

In a Jan. 29 ceremony, Iowa State’s volunteer group became the state’s first higher education institution to become affiliated with the statewide Keep Iowa Beautiful program.

Outdoor lunches on Central Campus, which are often a part of Veishea and Homecoming weeks, generate a lot of trash on campus, said Jennifer Garrett, coordinator of leadership and service in the Memorial Union’s student activities center.

Keep Iowa State Beautiful has been working with facilities, planning and management to ensure that Central Campus has enough trash cans to hold the trash generated there.

“[We’re] working with campus organizations to help them better manage their trash,” Garrett said.

Keep Iowa State Beautiful’s Adopt Campus program is an attempt to encourage students and faculty members to help keep campus clean. Individuals and teams can volunteer on the Keep Iowa State Beautiful Web site to organize groups to tackle litter on certain areas of campus.

“We’ll really start recruiting people for that in the beginning of March,” Garrett said, citing good weather as a motivator for outdoor volunteers.

The first Adopt Campus will be March 29, in collaboration with Veishea’s Service Day and the Ames-wide Stash the Trash program.

“We’re trying to collaborate with already-existing events,” Garrett said.

Keep Iowa State Beautiful is also trying to disseminate information to incoming freshmen during orientation and programs like Destination Iowa State to let them know of their campus expectations, Garrett said.

“[Our] main things are to help students understand that they shouldn’t litter – encourage students to pick up a little,” Garrett said.

According to the Keep Iowa Beautiful Web site, “affiliation with the state program will give the ISU program access to statewide resources and opportunities to network and share ideas.”

In order to become affiliated, Keep Iowa State Beautiful had to present a two-year plan for implementing the programs – “a timeline of goals,” Garrett said.

Paperwork included re-working a budget to supplement supplies for cleaning up campus, as well as a “litter survey,” Garrett said.

“[We had to] look and see what the litter problem was like,” Garrett said.

The survey included walking around campus and counting the number of trash items in areas on campus. The areas were compared to photos of “levels of litter,” provided from Keep Iowa Beautiful to rate them on cleanliness.

Keep Iowa State Beautiful is composed of representatives from students, facilities, planning and management, Professional and Scientific Council, Government of the Student Body, Inter-Residence Hall Association and the greek community.

Keep Iowa Beautiful is a part of the Keep America Beautiful campaign. Garrett said its initiatives are to enhance communities, prevent illegal dumping and give anti-littering education.

“[Keep America Beautiful] holds a conference each spring to share ideas, events and best practices,” Garrett said.