News

College plans for Earth Day

Sally Bitker
For the Logos

Millions of Americans took to the streets, parks and auditoriums to demonstrate for a healthy, sustainable environment in massive coast-to-coast rallies on April 22, 1970.

According to the Earth Day Network, thousands of colleges and universities organized protests against deterioration of the environment, loss of wilderness and extinction of wildlife.

Earth Week activities will be held during the week of April 18-22 on the NIACC campus this year. They are held to create an awareness of the environment and recycling of campus waste.

The planned activities repeated from last year include a clothing swap of collected clothes to trade or buy, prairie burn of one of NIACC’s prairies and kayaking on the NIACC pond.

Another activity “It Adds Up” will let students guess the weight of one week’s worth of campus trash.

Also scheduled are a contest of photos from the campus environment or Earth Week activities, and students and staff cleaning up the ditches along Highway 122 from College Drive to the Winnebago River bridge.

New plans this year include DVDs for VETS, a collection of DVDs, CDs, cell phones and DVD players for our military service people.

In addition, contests of unique quilted wall hangings using recycled materials, and a recycling scavenger hunt, where students locate recycling components on campus will be held. Also, locally-grown food will be presented by Stillwater Greenhouse.

Students and faculty have participated in Earth Day activities for more than 19 years.

The Student Environmental Group was instrumental in targeting the soda pop containers for recycling and developing the logo on the containers stating the funds were donated to the Student Emergency Loan fund.

“It’s here and it’s expanded,” Craig Zoellner, Student Environmental Group adviser, said.

Each year the group tries to incorporate new ideas into the event.

“Last year there were a lot of comments and awareness for recycling, such as pop cans that didn’t belong in the trash,” Tony Pappas, Facilities Management director, said.

More pop recycling containers were put around campus and plans for water bottles and metal containers are progressing.