This year on Wednesday, April 22, 2020, the world will celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Earth Day in a new way: almost entirely online. While we’re able to celebrate individually and in our small, sheltered communities — whether in Alpine or elsewhere — in many ways, we can also join the larger virtual community celebrations.
Wednesday, April 22, 11 AM CST: the Winter/Spring 2020 CFR (Council on Foreign Relations) Academic Conference Call series on the fiftieth anniversary of Earth Day, featuring Alice C. Hill, senior fellow for climate change policy at CFR, discussing how communities can reduce, absorb, and recover from climate change impacts and recommend policies to build greater climate resilience. *participation information will be updated soon!* Recommended reading for this call includes:
via Dr. Christopher Herrera, Chair, Assistant Professor, and Graduate Program Coordinator, Kinesiology and Human Performance
With far west Texas as our backyard, the SRSU Outdoor Education program offers many opportunities for students to gain skills to prepare them for leadership and careers in recreation and the outdoors.
A new course offering, Sustainable Tourism and Commercial Recreation (KES 3330) will employ several experiential learning strategies, including project-based learning and a service-learning project in which students will be responsible for developing a project to support sustainable efforts at a local/regional outdoor event (such as the annual overland race Trans-Pecos Ultra or a local 5k or 10k),
The Wildenthal Memorial Library’s Collection Development and Serials Librarian has opted to purchase Choice Online Reviews in order to cut down on unnecessary paper use in the collection development process.
via Betsy Evans, Education and Outreach Librarian and Sustainability Council Secretary
“The Campus Sustainability Hub is a one-stop for AASHE members to access toolkits and resource collections about all aspects of sustainability in higher education, from academics to operations to governance. To get started, browse by sustainability topic or content type, or enter search terms.”
AASHE is so much more than its STARS assessment tool. The association’s website is a treasure trove of information related to sustainability in higher education, especially within members-only area, the AASHE Campus Sustainability Hub.
It’s another password to memorize, yes, but the AASHE Campus Sustainability Hub has tons of resources, places to sign up for newsletters and listservs, and discussion forums for whatever specific sustainability interests you may have. I find it inspiring to receive their newsletters every week.
Check out this video about the burgeoning sustainability initiative here in Alpine produced by the Sul Ross Creative Services Department’s Bobby G. The video was debuted to new Lobo freshmen and transfer students at Camp Brand ‘Em 2019.
Students in Dr. Jeanne Qvarnstrom’s teacher education course, ED 3303, have been developing lesson plans that teach science concepts while including sustainability issues. Telisa Jones took her lesson, “Planting a Seed,” to Alpine Elementary School and taught it to over 60 third graders in Librarian Jennifer Mustain’s classes. Telisa’s lesson centered on the book A Seed is Sleepy by Dianna Hutts Aston, about the life cycle of a seed. Featured in the photo is Telisa Jones and Jennifer Mustain.
Survey data from the SRSU First Annual Sustainability Survey indicated that several Alpine faculty, staff, and students regularly deliver recyclables from their department or office to our local Hal Flanders Recycling Center, but it is true that Sul Ross State University does not have an official recycling program at any SRSU campus. (I will optimistically interject “yet,” here, because I’m an optimist.)
Alpine’s Hal Flanders Recycling Center, The Big Bend Gazette
But why not yet? Well, recycling is hard — and confusing. And to confuse you further, it isn’t that Sul Ross doesn’t recycle at all. We do, in fact, house dumpsters specifically for cardboard (behind the University Center). The cardboard is picked up and recycled by our waste management contractor. Our Physical Plant staff also collects paper* in blue bins that is gathered and delivered to Hal Flanders Recycling Center on an as-needed basis. So we do officially recycle. Except for the innumerable aluminum cans, plastic bottles, and other plastics that go into our landfill dumpsters every day.
Rather than get into all the specific logistics that must be addressed before an official recycling plan can be implemented on any SRSU campus (because there are many), I think for now I will share a recent story by National Public Radio about plastics recycling. The interactive website created by NPR helps to define some of the challenges with recycling plastics.Recycling is not a one-size-fits-all kind of business, and this information about plastics — the ones many of us see and use every day — provides a handy metaphor for the recycling business as a whole. The ability to recycle something differs by geography, material, market, machine-availability, and many other factors. These are all factors that Sul Ross must take into consideration before and during the implementation of a recycling program.
It’s important to note here that (as of the publication of this post) Alpine’s local Hal Flanders Recycling Center accepts only CLEAN plastics labeled with a 1 or a 2 (without their lids, because lids are often made of more rigid plastics) as well as stretchy film plastic and plastic red cups. (The red cups go to our local 4H Chapter.)
Learning more about the challenges of recycling may make you feel like recycling is a lost cause. I don’t believe it to be a lost cause, but I do believe there is a reason it is the last “R” in those oft-recited “three R’s” (reduce, reuse, recycle). If you want to be involved in the discussion about developing a more robust recycling program on the Alpine campus or any other Sul Ross campus, please get in touch. If you want to challenge yourself to reduce the amount of waste you create on campus and at home, do that too. Then, when “yet” comes, you’ll be even more ready.
*But please only put mixed paper, sans staples, in the blue bins unless your department has a specific grassroots recycling program in place. Our Physical Plant staff is only in charge of recycling mixed paper with the blue bins, and contaminating the mixed paper can pose negative effects on recycling for the entire Hal Flanders Recycling Center.
The following is an update from Marvin Cruz, the Assistant Director of Development for Residential Living
This summer, our full-time and student staff conducted room audits in every Lobo Village room and reset the limiters on all thermostats. This new limiter will offer freedom and comfort to all students while reducing our energy consumption as a campus. It’s one small step we’re taking to show that Res Life is heading in a more sustainable direction.
The following is an excerpt from an article by Travis Hendryx, Office of Public Relations, from news.sulross.edu
Students check out the new water bottle filling stations in the Gallego Center.
In an effort to foster conservation of natural resources, Sul Ross State University has recently taken measures with the installation of two water bottle filling stations.
The filling stations, which include the installation of two more units in September, are part of an overall plan to improve campus sustainability.
“These water filling stations are part of a pilot program we’re implementing in response to sustainability issues that were raised,” said Jesse Lara, Assistant Director of the Physical Plant.
Lara added that two units are currently up and running in the lower levels of the Pete P. Gallego Center and the Recreational Sports Center (RSC).
Two additional stations are scheduled to be installed on the second level at RSC and the lower level at Lawrence Hall in September.
Lara said each unit will incorporate a filtration system that will help purify and improve the taste of the water.
“Each station will also have a counter in the top-right corner so every time it’s used it will display how many bottles are saved,” Lara said.
