As we approach the end of the school year, many of our activities are ending alongside it. One of them is service, a yearlong activity that has been an eventful one to say the least. This year I was part of the Recycling and Sustainability service group that is the school’s leading environmental action group that helps to reduce the school’s ecological footprint by recycling resources and raising awareness about energy and resource use on campus. Due to the COVID crisis in the country, we had to do service virtually, through zoom. To uphold the mission of the service, we decided to do ‘Capstone Projects’ for each semester of service and each student was to present what he/she did in the service. Given below are my actions for each semester respectively:
Semester 1 Reflection:
During my first semester of the recycling and sustainability service, I planned to learn about the different ways of recycling and reducing my own carbon footprint. My initial plan was to research about the waste management of the apartment complex that I live in as well as aid the social enterprise, Good Market in their endeavors (I had done a winter intern with them. More about it can be found in my CAS blog). These issues, as the name of the service states, revolves around learning about the state of our communities when it comes to recycling and sustainability. These issues have significant importance since to make a substantial difference, everyone needs to start from their homes and then build outwards.
About half way through the first semester, some progress was attempted to be made in the form of research and application. My apartment complex separates organic from inorganic waste, but I did not know what they do after the waste is collected. I tried to research about the waste management situation in my apartment complex, but the COVID 19 restrictions made it difficult for me to interact with people and ask them questions. So, I decided to look online for some answers. After some online research, I came to the conclusion that it is highly likely that the inorganic waste from my apartment is dumped on a landfill and I could not make a reasonable conclusion about the organic waste. Asides from this, I planned to work on the carbon footprint of my home and I displayed the positives (the homegrown plants, waste separation) on our Padlet. I also continued to help Good Market virtually (unfortunately, due to the COVID 19 restrictions) and helped them organize and make documents.
After an eventful and insightful semester of Recycling and Sustainability, I come out with a changed mindset. Prior to this, I have seldom thought about my carbon footprint and the consequences of my everyday actions. However, after learning about the damage we inflict on our planet as well as learning about what others do and how easy it is to live a ‘green’ lifestyle, I have actively started to monitor my actions and pick the ones that have the least effect on the environment. I learned about composting (I cannot implement it due to the nature of my housing), the waste management issues with our communities, where our power comes from and how much of it is polluting, some steps to live a ‘green’ lifestyle and many others. I have helped Good Market in their mission towards a better and more sustainable community (I have helped a relatively small amount, but everything little thing counts).
Semester 2 Reflection:
This semester was much less eventful. The increased amount of schoolwork combined with the difficulties that comes with online learning substantially decreased the time I spent on the Capstone Project for the second semester. So I decided to work on my self-awareness and my personal carbon footprint on the lowest level: my household.
To do this, I focused on the power usage of my household as well as waste produced by my house. For the power usage, I went around my house and measured the power requirements for the largest electrical devices like laptops, air conditioners, washing machines etc. After this, I estimated the amount of time they were switched on for and by multiplying the power requirement and the time of usage, it gives you the power used by that device. After adding all of them up I reached this conclusion: my household uses around 4660 kW hour of power each month.
Next, for the waste I weighed the mass of the dry and wet waste produced by my household each day, for seven days straight. I then took the average of those masses and multiplied it by 30 days to get the amount of waste produced each month. I reached the following conclusion: my household produces about 90 kg of waste each month.
That concludes my reflections on this year of service. The biggest dampener to my service experience, as it probably is for many others, is COVID 19. My interactions and real world experiences were limited to almost none and this was one of the biggest challenges. Asides from this, I had a fun and engaging semester of Recycling and Sustainability. This CAS experience showcased perseverance and commitment year long during these trying times to help further the mission of the service I was part of. Secondly, I also demonstrated engagement with issues of global significance: issues regarding environmental impact. Lastly, I also recognize and consider the ethics and implications of my daily life actions by looking at the environmental impact of my household.