By Petra Dreiser

You may not know her name, but you might have seen her work: Madeleine (Maddy) Milne is the woman behind the plump raccoons populating a lot of the U of T Trash Team’s outreach materials, especially its much-used theory of change illustration. The cheerful visuals are just one of the many ways in which Milne has lent her talents to a better understanding of plastic pollution and the battle against it. Recently, her dedication earned the EEB alumna (BSc 2022) and U of T Trash Team volunteer a 2025 Arbor Award, the University of Toronto’s highest recognition of volunteer service.

Milne described the acknowledgment as “a really nice surprise,” meaningful especially because it celebrates the work of sharing science with the people it affects: “Doing the research is important in its own way,” she says, “but it’s so much more valuable if you’re actually sharing it with the people it impacts.” 

Milne’s path into pollution prevention began in 2020, when she first volunteered in Chelsea Rochman’s lab as an undergraduate student and quickly “got hooked on plastic and microplastic pollution.” Her newfound interest soon led her to join the U of T Trash Team, co-founded by Rochman and Susan Debreceni, where she helped create digital learning resources like fact and activity sheets amid the COVID pandemic.  

Since then, Milne has graduated from U of T, earned a master’s degree at the University of Manitoba, pursued her own research, and taken on the position of manager at the Rochman Lab, but her work with the U of T Trash Team continues: creating more educational materials, leading litter cleanups and workshops, representing the group at community events across Ontario, and training new volunteers. “The combo of doing research and outreach has been my background over the past five years,” she says. 

Rochman, who nominated Milne for the Arbor Award, emphasizes that “her role as a volunteer has been pivotal.” Describing Milne as “a trusted expert . . . [who] understands the value and mission of our team,” Rochman adds, “we are grateful for all she’s given us—which helps us stabilize our team, grow our team, and maintain our vision.”  

“Doing the research is important in its own way, but it’s so much more valuable if you’re actually sharing it with the people it impacts.” 

What makes this honour especially notable is how quickly Milne has made her mark. At the Arbor celebration, she was struck by how many fellow recipients had volunteered for decades, while she had contributed “only . . . a few years.”  The Arbor Award underscores the significant, tangible impact of Milne’s service in a comparatively short time—service that bridges rigorous, solutions-based research and public engagement. 

In her own research, Milne has worked on projects monitoring microplastics in Lake Ontario fish and in grocery-store foods, and she contributed to a multi‑year, whole‑lake study at the Experimental Lakes Area, examining how microplastics move through freshwater ecosystems and affect plankton communities. This work, like much of what Milne does, showcases the sheer scale of microplastic pollution: “It’s pervasive. Microplastics have been found pretty much everywhere they’ve been looked for—whether that’s the deep sea, remote mountain ranges, human blood, brains, our food.” 

Such pervasiveness could lead to a sense of doom and overwhelm, but it inspires Milne. Because plastic pollution affects everyone, she firmly believes that everyone can also have a part in combating it through small changes in everyday life: cutting single-use plastics, replacing them with more sustainable materials, reusing and recycling, employing local tools like the Waste Wizard, making conscious consumer choices. And of course volunteering with community groups like the U of T Trash Team. 

Are these measured, individual steps the silver-bullet solution to an entrenched, structural problem of massive proportions? “Of course not,” says Milne; she’s not naive. A complex problem requires a multitude of different, interlocking solutions and a wide perspective. “But you need to make the first step.” 

For that, awareness, engagement, and a sense of empowerment prove key. Which is where Milne’s raccoons come in. Bright, friendly visuals help people feel welcome rather than intimidated, she says: “Drawings that are kind of fun and lighthearted encourage people to be excited and hopeful about tackling the problem.” Building on the team’s original logo conceptualized by a former graduate student, Milne’s illustrations cleverly embrace one of Toronto’s most iconic urban residents as a gateway to science and solutions—and just like that, the oft-maligned animal becomes a playful mascot that symbolizes collective action on waste.  

Congratulations!