A new initiative from the Division of Student Affairs combines waste reduction efforts, volunteer opportunities and student resource destigmatization to create a campus thrift store.
Campus Thrift, announced on March 2, on the Oakley Resource Center Instagram page, is a secondhand ‘shopping’ space for Murray State students to find commonly desired items for free. Abigail Cox, director of the Oakley Student Lounge and the Oakley Resource Center, has organized a donation collection to prepare for the space’s opening next semester.
“We want this to be a waste reduction project, which is obviously going to take the effort of lots of people on campus,” Cox said. “We want this to be a service-oriented project, so it can be a place where students who like to volunteer to be involved with, or students who are just interested in giving back.”
The announcement’s list of acceptable items included casual clothing, bags and physical media such as books, card games and music. A list of unaccepted items specifies that Campus Thrift will not take items like undergarments, jewelry, professional clothing and food. Cox said this will help ensure item quality control in the space and prevent overlap with the Career Closet and Racer Food Pantry.
The concept for Campus Thrift was suggested by Sidda Roche (they/them), a senior anthropology major and staff member of the Oakley Student Lounge, when Cox prompted lounge employees to research other universities’ student affairs departments for activities they would like to see at Murray State. Roche focused their search on the University of Arkansas, where the student affairs department promoted the SEW Closet, a thrift-style campus “store” with donated clothing items.
Imagining a similar initiative at Murray State reminded Roche of the discarded items left in the residential colleges every year when students move out in the spring.
“I’ve filled trash bags full of clothes when I’m doing a closet clean out so I don’t have to carry all of this stuff home,” they said. “My immediate thought was this would be so beneficial for campus, not just so people can go to get items they need — or want, it’s not necessarily just a need thing.”
While waste reduction on campus is a forward-facing goal of this initiative, the organizers also aim to challenge the “needs-based language” that can prevent students from partaking in available resources in fear that their needs are not severe enough.
“People feel like they don’t want to take away an opportunity from somebody else,” Roche said. “In reality, a lot of these resources are for you, but a lot of times there’s this ‘I’m not starving and I have clothes on my back’ mentality that hopefully we can try to avoid with Campus Thrift.”
Cox said a large part of making students feel welcome at Campus Thrift is collaboration with other organizations, such as the nonprofit leadership and social work programs, to provide students pursuing those majors the opportunity to fulfill their volunteer requirements.
“We want to involve as many places on campus in collecting items because that indicates to students that this is your space (and) this is a give and take situation,” she said. “You are invited to be a part of this and partake in this … There is value in providing students with something they feel engaged and connected to.”
As Roche recommended when pitching the initiative, Campus Thrift volunteers will collect accepted items from the residential halls at the end of the semester. Chris Trzepacz, college head of Clark Residential College and chair of the council of college heads, said the residence halls encourage students to drop off their unwanted items in a designated area instead of discarding things like functional appliances, old textbooks and clothing in the trashrooms.
“There’s a lot of stuff, so when (Cox) mentioned the new thrifting closet, that sounded like a great way to benefit our students directly,” Trzepacz said. “It’s expensive to go to college, and there’s a lot of gently used stuff out there. It’s a benefit to the students to have access to that.”
Items left in residence halls are collected every year by Angel’s Attic, a local nonprofit thrift store. Angel’s Attic sorts through viable donations and trash at their own facility, reducing the strain on residential halls and janitorial staff during the already hectic end-of-year activities.
“It’s a win for all three of us,” Trzepacz said. “Residential colleges get to serve their populations, the Oakley Resource Center is supporting students and Angel’s Attic is serving the larger community. It’s a great initiative.”
Cox said volunteers will collect a few moving bags’ worth of acceptable items from the residence halls before Angel’s Attic arrives to take the rest.
“We wanted to make sure it’s successful and a quality experience for students, and for that to happen, it needs to be organized, manageable and something they feel like is done well,” she said. “We want to be very intentional with the volunteers that we’re looking for a variety of items, styles and sizes … Think about the general student body and make sure you’re collecting a variety of things for a variety of people.”
Campus Thrift opens in the fall 2026 semester inside the Oakley Resource Center, c102 Oakley Applied Science, a space currently used as a study lounge. Cox said students must provide their Racer Card to claim up to five items per month from the space.
For more information about donations, end-of-year collection volunteering or volunteering in the space next semester, email acox33@murraystate.edu.
This article was originally published by the Murray State News, the student newspaper at Murray State University.
