How it Works

Once you've identified the area you want to clean up, get started. Or follow our day-by-day guide during the campaign week of 10 – 14 March. Just remember not to stress and to go at your own pace.

- Day 1: Delete any emails you no longer need and check your mailbox archive.

- Day 2: Gather the team and have a look at your servers: simplify the structure, eliminate any digital weeds and clean up double and triple archiving. Any folders left on the server from colleagues who have left? View the contents and delete any files that are no longer needed.

- Day 3: Remove unused apps from your devices.

- Day 4: Eliminate cloud files. Depending on the services you use, as with your servers, consider which folders you really still need and whether there are any archived duplicates.

- Day 5: This year, the university is undergoing a web relaunch. As part of the project, migration to the new web design will begin. It’s a good idea to check your own web pages for outdated content. Deleting redundant pages, documents and images creates a better overview and makes published content more relevant.

Build some time into your schedule going forward to review your use of digital resources and identify potential ways to save space:

1. How can I create time and space in my daily schedule for digital decluttering?  
2. What data should be stored where?
3. Which searches might be a waste of time? Traditional web searches, especially those using language models such as GPT, also use a lot of power.¹
4. Regularly empty the recycle bins from various applications and clean out your downloads folder.
5. Remember to 'off-board' staff when they leave. Review their data with them and delete personal folders that are no longer in use.

If you would like to take part in the Digital CleanUp campaign week, document your experience and write to us at nachhaltigkeitverw.uni-koeln.de to let us know how it went.

Respondents will have the opportunity to win one of ten €10 vouchers for the Studierendenwerk canteens!

¹ Alex de Vries (2023). The growing energy footprint of artificial intelligence