Three City College students have given new life to the old phrase “reduce, reuse, and recycle” with the release of their sustainability orientation video early this January.
Students Tomas Uden, Scott Goldstein and Clayton O’Connell showcased different methods college students can use to conserve and reduce waste. The video encourages actions such as composting food scraps and riding a bike or carpooling to school.
The inspiration for the video came from a similar one produced by Cornell University that Uden came across. He believes the video can make a difference to the City College community.
“It’s better to start small in your community than to try and save the world,” said Uden, who studied at City College for three semesters before transferring to Penn State University.
The creation of the video has been a process that has taken place over a few years. While studying at City College, Uden took an Environmental Studies 101 class with Dr. Adam Green and was inspired to do more.
Working with Green and the Environmental Studies 200 class, “Projects in Sustainability,” they were able to acquire the funds and support needed to create the video.
The group was able to hire Martin Risberg, a Swedish videographer, for the project.
Facts and statistics for the video were taken from the City College’s sustainability plan. The video is an outreach program that aims to help educate students and faculty on being more environmentally conscious, O’Connell said.
“It’s all about being a student on campus,” he said.
The video shows different ways students can change their ways of life to be more sustainable. It shows where stations that students can use to fill up water bottles are located, and informs them on the incentives offered by City College’s Commute program.
“We really wanted to focus on transportation,” said Goldstein, an environmental science major. “The school really wants to lower single occupancy vehicles as much as they can in the next five or 10 years.”
The international students department will show the video as a part of their orientation. Uden hopes it will be shown as part of an introduction of the environmental sciences classes.
The video may impact a student’s decision to come study at City College, Uden said.
“I wanted to make a difference,” Goldstein said. “This was the only project in the class that I believe had a solid end goal.”
The students hope that the video will lead to less plastic bottles circulating campus, fewer cars in the parking lot, and more sustainable ideas passed by word of mouth.
“The video’s not telling you to do anything crazy,” O’Connell says. “It is simply informing you of easier ways to live your life.”
More information can be found on the college’s environmental studies webpage.
