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CORVALLIS - Oregon State University and University of Oregon students have always had a reputation for talking trash about each other, but this year students at the two schools are gaining a nationwide reputation for recycling.

In the 2005 national intercollegiate RecycleMania contest, Oregon State University took fourth place with a recycling average of 53.29 pounds per student, while University of Oregon scored a second-place finish with 65.1 pounds per student. This was the first year OSU competed in RecycleMania and the UO's second year.

The contest measured pounds per person recycled in university residence halls and dining centers during a 10-week period last spring, said Justin Fleming, OSU recycling program manager.

Miami University of Ohio took first in the nation with 66.19 pounds per student, while Bowling Green State University took third place with 55.77 pounds.

With the program restricted to campus living and dining areas, much of recycling efforts fall to first-year university students, Fleming said. "For the most part, people are pretty supportive of our recycling programs on campus. And in this case we're talking about students who are often still adjusting to their first-time away from home and who have a number of concerns other than recycling as they modify their lifestyles."

Some 3,200 OSU students recycled about 185,000 pounds of materials during the competition and were narrowly edged out of third place, Fleming said. After working out the bugs this year, OSU will be a strong contender for a first-place finish next year, he added.

"It'll be fun to do this again," he said. "In addition to boosting awareness of campus recycling, the effort helps us to tweak our campus recycling program and improve our overall operations."

Nowhere is the impact of the recycling efforts more obvious than at the campus garbage dumpsters, said Mike Holden, general manager for Aramark Facility Services, which provides custodial services for the OSU campus. Holden notes that the amount of trash generated on campus shrinks each year as recycling efforts grow.

RecycleMania started as a rivalry between students at Miami University and Ohio University in 2001 and subsequently spread nationwide. This year, 49 universities competed nationwide.