Sometimes, it's hard to figure out ways to contribute to keeping the environment healthy. Maybe you can never remember to bring a reusable straw with you, or you live in a place where public transportation isn't accessible. Maybe you just don't have a green thumb. But one of the easiest ways you can keep nature clean is by going out and picking up any trash you see. Whether it be on the beach, on the sidewalk, or around campus, you're more than likely going to find some sort of trash just by going for a quick walk.
My college is luckily a very environmentally-conscious school. Over the weekend, they conducted a campus-wide cleanup. It took about forty of us a little over three hours to collect waste around campus, sort it out, and weigh it. For all of us, this was a pretty eye-opening event. From the outside, the students and faculty here seem very eco-friendly but going around and seeing just how much trash is actually left on the ground is so saddening. Luckily there are people that are willing to take out some of their time to counteract those behaviors.
I arrived at the waterfront at 1pm on Saturday afternoon. I saw buckets, gloves, clipboards, and trash grabbers sprawled out everywhere. We began to divide out into groups, choosing who would tackle the long strip of beach on the perimeter or campus, and who would go around the dorms and academic centers. We would all be taking forms, (like the one below on the left) that had each type of litter, the total number of that waste, the location, and total weight. I decided to group up with my friends Bella, Bria, Marisa, and Ethan (below on the right) and we chose to head to the dorm we all live in. We figured we know how people disrespect the grounds around it and we've all witnessed waste here and there. We had no idea how bad it actually was.
We started picking up trash at the beginning of the drive to our dorm. We initially got a lot of plastic bottle, plastic wrappers, and bottle caps. Then we got closer to where the desgnated smoking area is. Even though we were a good thirty yards from it, we picked up over 140 cigarette butts on the road. It was truthfully disgusting, and frustrating that people aren't considerate enough to put there butts in the receptacle. As we moved closer to the dorm, we picked up lots of styrofoam, paper, aluminum, and much more plastic. Just within 20 minutes, we had almost filled an entire five gallon bucket.
We continued moving around the complex, picking up litter and marking it on the sheet as we went along. When we went around to the back of the building, it was even worse. Our dorm is adjacent to the highway, and while we have a chainlink fence and some shrubbery for privacy, a lot of the trash thrown out by people on the highway finds its way onto our grass. We picked up fast food wrappers and broken bottles, again frustrated that even other people's trash was affecting our beautiful campus. But that part wasn't even where we found the most trash.
Between the parking lot and the doors to our rooms, there is a raised strip of dirt and mulch with a few planted trees here and there, but is mostly bare. Here we found e-cigarettes, metal silverware, food, plastic, and glass, even though this is a barefoot, glass-free campus. The five of us began thinking of ways we could improve our front yard and somebody suggested we propose to start a garden on the strip of dirt. This would make the dorm more visually pleasing and also deter people from throwing their trash right out the door.
After we had been picking up trash for about three hours, we headed back to the waterfront. There, all the groups dumped out their buckets and sorted their trash between plastic waste, aluminum, glass, and litter with brand names on it that could be audited. Then we could see what brands and types of waste are most abundantly found on campus. We then weighed all of the trash and finally disposed of it.
The coastal and campus groups combined ended up collecting well over 300 pounds of litter. This was an eye-opening figure for all of us. While it's discouraging to see a high amount of trash on such a beautiful campus that seems very passionate about the environment, it's also nice to see how many people will come out and work together to make it a lot nicer for everyone. A task as simple as this can make a huge contribution and is also really helpful as the data that's collected can give the institution an idea of where the most waste is found, what kind it is, and possible solutions to keep things cleaner.
"To leave the world better than you found it, sometimes you have to pick up other people's trash" -Bill Nye.
So the next time you go outside, look around, pick up a few pieces of trash, and leave the world better than you found it. As long as everyone makes a contribution, we can all make a big change.
