The BU Cleanup Crew is committed to cleaning the surrounding area and encouraging others to do the same.
The club was started in the beginning of fall 2017 by president, Malini Wijesinghe, senior biochemistry, philosophy and Spanish triple major, who had been pondering on the idea for a while.
“I would keep talking about how passionate I was about keeping our community clean and how much I want to do this,” Wijesinghe said. “I saw how much Bradley needed this because there were not so many opportunities to bridge the Bradley and Peoria community gap.”
Once the club started going out to the community, many students from Bradley joined in Friday mornings to walk around Peoria and pick up all the trash they could.
“I joined the club right when it began because I hate seeing trash on the streets as it causes pollution and animals tend to eat it,” said Hanna Alexander, a senior finance major and active member of the club.
Every week the members of the club are accompanied by new students joining to help clean the area. This includes several collaborations with the Delta Upsilon fraternity, Student Senate and Whittier Primary School among others.
“I’ve definitely met a lot of people through the BU Cleanup Crew,” said Alissa Schovanec, senior marketing major. “Sometimes, while we are out cleaning, we will have people passing by, stop and ask us who we are and what we are doing. They are always very excited about the impact we are trying to make.”
The club’s adviser is Steve Tyler, volunteer assistant coach of the Bradley tennis team.
“I see the tangible results of the group picking up, especially the neighborhood near campus just looks better,” Tyler said. “It’s so good, especially because it is the student body initiating this entire process of cleaning up.”
Tyler is the chairman of the mayor’s litter committee, so he picks up trash every day.
Because this is one of the clubs that requires hands-on work that can be physically draining, it could be considered hard for full-time college student to regularly attend the clean-up days.
“I have never once thought of quitting or backing out of this club because it helps me to directly improve the quality of the environment and inspires me to have a greater respect for my surroundings,” said Kathryn Graf, junior accounting and Spanish double major.
Graf will be serving as vice president of the club next semester along with the new president, Lilly Johnson.
The BU Cleanup Crew meets every Friday at 9 a.m. to pick up litter around the area. For more information, email bradleycleanupcrew@gmail.com.
