Everyday is Earth Day, or it should be. At Teachers College, the Go Green Committee is striving to create a climate of environmental consciousness and make the green movement relevant to everyone’s lives.

As part of our efforts, Pete Seeger, the great folk singer and environmentalist, is coming to TC to perform at our Earth Day Festival on April 18. In fact, mark your calendars for Earth Week starting April 18 and Earth Day on April 22. The festival will include eco-friendly vendors selling clothes and other items and food from throughout the area. It will also include tables dedicated to the arts, and because this is TC, there will be a “funky fashions” table for children to make costumes using materials like thrift store fabric and aluminum foil.

 

But every day is Earth Day, and the Go Green Committee has been stepping up its efforts to reduce TC’s daily impact on the environment. We are creating a comprehensive, campus-wide recycling program (see story on page 1) that will include batteries, light bulbs and devices like cellular phones, as well as paper and plastic.

 

In fact, there are many things you can do to decrease your carbon footprint. You can eat locally grown foods and thereby reduce emissions from trucks or trains that have to transport these goods. Filtering your own water, rather than buying bottled water, is a great way to reduce your impact on the environment. Using public transportation, walking and driving a more fuel-efficient car will also cut down your carbon footprint.

 

It also helps if you replace your light fixtures with fluorescent bulbs, dry your clothes on a clothesline, shorten the length of your showers, reduce the temperature in your home by a couple of degrees in the winter and cut back on air conditioning in the summer.

 

The Go Green energy subcommittee is hoping to hold an energy reduction competition among TC residential halls in an effort to encourage residents to be more conscientious about their electricity use. In addition, our education subcommittee is informing the TC community about ways to reduce our carbon footprint by encouraging the recycling of plastic bags and giving away reusable tote bags. Although plastic bags have been around for only about 50 years, scientists say it will take up to 1,000 years for them to decompose.

 

In the next few weeks, we’ll be selling TC Go Green Committee water bottles. This will be an opportunity for people to reuse their water bottles instead of using plastic cups every time they drink water.

 

In closing: don’t forget to check out our Facebook page and our upcoming Web site. For more information about the committee, please e-mail gogreentc@gmail.com And, of course, keep it green.

 

Jaymie Stein

 

Co-Chair, Student Senate Go Green Committee