grad alum Samaras
SES Alum Zach Samaras Tackles Waste
Story by Alex Quebbeman
Zach Samaras discovered a passion for waste management while working on his master's degree at Loyola's School of Environmental Sustainability. He now helps companies and organizations reduce waste as a technical assistance engineer with the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center.
Zach Samaras leads waste audits, sorting trash to identify strategies for cutting waste.
After graduating with communications and marketing degrees from Indiana University Bloomington, Zach Samaras worked in the printing industry for seven years. Between sales and account management, he learned a lot about the business world and what it means to engage with clients firsthand. However, the work felt unfulfilling, so Zach started considering a career change. After taking an eight-week sustainability class through the Chicago Conservation Corps and volunteering with Friends of the Chicago River, he knew he wanted to pursue environmental science and sustainability.
Being from the suburbs, Zach was looking for a local Chicago-area master’s degree program. After considering different options, he decided that the environmental science program at Loyola’s School of Environmental Sustainability (SES) was the best fit. Having the choice of the research or professional track was something that Zach particularly liked about the SES program.
“I knew I wanted to be in the professional track to understand what it looks like for the business world to become more sustainable,” he said. Zach’s course of study focused on sustainable business management and included classes geared toward the circular economy and circular business models.
Throughout his time at Loyola, Zach realized that he has a passion for waste management. His sustainable business management class introduced him to the idea that waste is a human creation. He decided this was a problem he wanted to tackle. “Every company and every household creates waste, and we have to ask ourselves how to manage that. With the way we’ve designed our society, there’s waste in everything we do, and it’s impossible to avoid it. I want to work with business entities and community members so we can all think about waste differently,” he explained.
Zach graduated from Loyola in December 2020. Despite the pandemic’s obstacles, he immediately landed a part-time job with the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC), a division of the Prairie Research Institute at the University of Illinois. After working there for a few months, Zach became a full-time employee. He primarily works on their zero-waste team, providing technical assistance on waste reduction and diversion and materials management. Zach works with businesses, nonprofits, municipalities, manufacturers, and other entities in and around Illinois. He enjoys visiting different companies and other organizations to do waste audits. The process involves collecting a day’s or week’s worth of trash and recycling, sorting through it, and then collecting data to help the business identify starting points for waste reduction.
Zach’s team has also been working with Feeding Illinois, the Illinois chapter of Feeding America that manages the eight food banks across the state. Feeding Illinois is interested in a ‘farm-to-food bank’ program that captures any surplus or off-spec food from farms that would otherwise be left in the field or go to waste and gets it to food banks and pantries. Zach spends most of his time on this project, which is also his favorite part of the job. “The data we’ve collected shows that farmers are looking for outlets for their additional surplus and that a lot of them aren’t working with food banks yet,” Zach said. Through surveys, focus groups, and pilot projects, Zach and his team work directly with farmers to determine the best and easiest approach for everyone. This project has been very interactive and involves a lot of relationship-building. “It’s gotten me out around the state and into the agricultural space. I’ve been able to interact with a lot of different people and organizations and work in spaces where I previously haven’t been,” Zach said.
Zach said his time as an SES graduate student prepared him to work with people and businesses and help them through their sustainability problems. He said two classes were especially beneficial: Human Dimensions of Conservation and Sustainable Systems, Social Perspectives. “In those classes, I learned about surveying and focus groups, which is what I do now in my current job. I also learned that you can’t force change onto others. We have to listen and learn from them in order to help them,” Zach said. “I still look back at some of my old textbooks and notes from those classes to determine the best way to approach a sustainability challenge and find a solution that works for all parties involved.”
SES Alum Zach Samaras Tackles Waste
Story by Alex Quebbeman
Zach Samaras discovered a passion for waste management while working on his master's degree at Loyola's School of Environmental Sustainability. He now helps companies and organizations reduce waste as a technical assistance engineer with the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center.
After graduating with communications and marketing degrees from Indiana University Bloomington, Zach Samaras worked in the printing industry for seven years. Between sales and account management, he learned a lot about the business world and what it means to engage with clients firsthand. However, the work felt unfulfilling, so Zach started considering a career change. After taking an eight-week sustainability class through the Chicago Conservation Corps and volunteering with Friends of the Chicago River, he knew he wanted to pursue environmental science and sustainability.
Being from the suburbs, Zach was looking for a local Chicago-area master’s degree program. After considering different options, he decided that the environmental science program at Loyola’s School of Environmental Sustainability (SES) was the best fit. Having the choice of the research or professional track was something that Zach particularly liked about the SES program.
“I knew I wanted to be in the professional track to understand what it looks like for the business world to become more sustainable,” he said. Zach’s course of study focused on sustainable business management and included classes geared toward the circular economy and circular business models.
Throughout his time at Loyola, Zach realized that he has a passion for waste management. His sustainable business management class introduced him to the idea that waste is a human creation. He decided this was a problem he wanted to tackle. “Every company and every household creates waste, and we have to ask ourselves how to manage that. With the way we’ve designed our society, there’s waste in everything we do, and it’s impossible to avoid it. I want to work with business entities and community members so we can all think about waste differently,” he explained.
Zach graduated from Loyola in December 2020. Despite the pandemic’s obstacles, he immediately landed a part-time job with the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC), a division of the Prairie Research Institute at the University of Illinois. After working there for a few months, Zach became a full-time employee. He primarily works on their zero-waste team, providing technical assistance on waste reduction and diversion and materials management. Zach works with businesses, nonprofits, municipalities, manufacturers, and other entities in and around Illinois. He enjoys visiting different companies and other organizations to do waste audits. The process involves collecting a day’s or week’s worth of trash and recycling, sorting through it, and then collecting data to help the business identify starting points for waste reduction.
Zach’s team has also been working with Feeding Illinois, the Illinois chapter of Feeding America that manages the eight food banks across the state. Feeding Illinois is interested in a ‘farm-to-food bank’ program that captures any surplus or off-spec food from farms that would otherwise be left in the field or go to waste and gets it to food banks and pantries. Zach spends most of his time on this project, which is also his favorite part of the job. “The data we’ve collected shows that farmers are looking for outlets for their additional surplus and that a lot of them aren’t working with food banks yet,” Zach said. Through surveys, focus groups, and pilot projects, Zach and his team work directly with farmers to determine the best and easiest approach for everyone. This project has been very interactive and involves a lot of relationship-building. “It’s gotten me out around the state and into the agricultural space. I’ve been able to interact with a lot of different people and organizations and work in spaces where I previously haven’t been,” Zach said.
Zach said his time as an SES graduate student prepared him to work with people and businesses and help them through their sustainability problems. He said two classes were especially beneficial: Human Dimensions of Conservation and Sustainable Systems, Social Perspectives. “In those classes, I learned about surveying and focus groups, which is what I do now in my current job. I also learned that you can’t force change onto others. We have to listen and learn from them in order to help them,” Zach said. “I still look back at some of my old textbooks and notes from those classes to determine the best way to approach a sustainability challenge and find a solution that works for all parties involved.”