Bags of materials that needed to be shredded were encouraged to be brought by students and faculty to the front of the Information Technology office from 10 a.m.-12 p.m. Oct. 14.
“Students need to shred important documents,” said Cheryl O’Dell, director of information security and compliance in the IT office. “Documents that have Social Security numbers, maybe some student information or anything that has any private information should be shredded instead of just recycled or thrown in the trash.”
These documents include Social Security cards and bank or credit card statements. It also includes anything with birth dates or other personal information.
“I shred all of my old high school IDs and my expired driver’s license,” said Derrick Duncan, freshman education major. “All my grades are online, so I don’t really have to worry about throwing them away or making sure no one sees them.”
IT was aided by a company called Document Resources, Inc., which specializes in document shredding and data storage.
“Document Resources is a bonded company that takes our documents, and after they shred them, they recycle the shredding,” O’Dell said. “It is a really good process because we are also being green during all of this.”
The company’s main line of business is colleges looking to get rid of old papers. Before destroying anything, they make sure people know there will be no rescuing the documents after they are thrown in the truck.
According to an ESU press release, there is an authorization for those interested in shredding to sign “giving permission to Document Resources, Inc. to accept, destroy, and recycle materials.”
This is the second year that IT has sponsored shred day at ESU. Last year, teachers and departments were the main supply of paper, but this year IT has used a new campaign to specifically reach out to students – BuzzIn and Hornet Connection.
“When I checked my email…it said that they were having a shred day,” Duncan said. “I thought it would be them actually shredding stuff and throwing it away, but it turned out that it was all thrown in a truck.”
IT presented the shred day as a way for those on campus to be aware of the ability to shred their unwanted papers and help out the environment at the same time.
Next year, students are encouraged to bring any papers with personal information to campus’s shred day.
