Loyola’s residency halls will soon become a lot more eco-friendly.

This year, Loyola became one of the 50 schools, universities, government agencies and other community organizations that Keep America Beautiful awarded the 2017 Coca-Cola Public Space Recycling Grant.

Keep America Beautiful, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting environmental sustainability, awarded Loyola over $5,000, which equates to 30 recycling bins. These bins will be placed on every floor of every residence hall Friday, April 20, according to Abigail Justice, Student Government Association chief of staff.

One of SGA President Ben Weil and Vice President Blane Mader’s six initiatives, titled “Maroon, Gold and Green,” aimed to put more recycling bins on Loyola’s campus over the course of the next five years. This grant allowed SGA to expedite that process and fulfill this initiative within the year, according to Justice.

“More than anything, I think just being able to provide students access to these recycling bins, as well as education, is what’s going to have a greater impact, as students will become more a part of the campus’s environmentally friendly culture,” Justice said.

SGA will also host an informational event on the proper way to recycle on Thursday, April 19 in the Peace Quad during the window. This event is geared towards helping students better understand what can and cannot go into recycling bins, as this initiative is only effective if the student body is educated on how to recycle, according to Justice.

“You can’t have caps on your water bottles. You have to recycle them without the caps, and a lot of people just have no clue about that,”Mader said.

Carolyn Ives, environmental studies senior, said that the new recycling bins will go a long way in inspiring a greener culture at Loyola.

“They definitely make you more conscious, like ‘I should be thinking about this and considering my impact,’” Ives said. “And it all starts with these little things, like putting more recycling bins all over campus, and from there, we can do bigger things with that.”