SAINT PETER— Following a typical fall semester weekend in Norelius Hall, first-year Sarah Gatt collected the entirety of section 3C’s recyclables and turned them into a Mankato redemption center, resulting in a payoff of $38,000. Gatt used this revenue to pay for an entire year’s worth of her college tuition in advance.

Gatt explained the origins of her personal scholarship in her waking up to a “completely trashed” 3C section on Sunday morning.  “Megan in 204 usually throws some pretty wild pregame parties in her room, so I figured there would be a few bottles around,” continued  Gatt. In addition to the usual mix of vomit-saturated pizza boxes and pizza-saturated vomit stains, Gatt was pleased to discover a larger-than-usual overflow of Busch Light cans on the floor of their section common area.

Show Us Your Cans Redemption Center was less than enthused about Gatt’s donation. “You know how much money we keep around this place? 87 dollars. We keep 87 dollars around here,” said manager Beth Lumpkin. “People don’t come to these places to drop off enough cans to buy a freaking Chrysler Town & Country. People come here to get an extra five bucks for a gallon of gas or a rack of Hamm’s.”

A financially-strained college administration has praised Gatt’s move, calling it “clever, sassy, and completely in keeping with our institution’s core values” in a recent press release. Gatt’s initiative has also inspired a new Physical Plant initiative to redeem campus recyclables to help meet the college’s operating expenses. In collaboration with this initiative, Residential Life has also announced plans to make Keystone Light and Red Dog available for purchase in all first-year residential halls to fill the college’s recycling depositories to new levels and prevent further cuts to academic departments.