Charitable Reuse
BY MARK LENNON
Charitable Reuse: A Four-Win Solution
E
very school has excess furniture. It may be
hundreds or thousands of pieces when you
build a new school and empty the old one.
It may be the odd stream of items that find their
way to basement storage areas. It may be old caf-
eteria tables that you’re replacing, or old bleach-
ers from the gym. Every day, every month, every
year, schools have excess furniture.
What to do with it? That’s a painful question. You
can put it up for auction or look for a reseller, but
there’s not much demand. You can give it away to
teachers, or have a yard sale for the community. But
there’s not much demand. There’s just not much de-
mand for used school furniture. So most of the time, it
gets thrown away.
There’s an alternative: charitable reuse.
The Beginning: June 2002
A parking lot filled with dorm furniture. That was
the beginning of IRN’s Reuse Program. IRN was
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