The Zero Waste Month campaign, pioneered by the non-profit organization, Race to Zero Waste, was celebrated in October to emphasize the progress made by the waste management industry in recycling; all of this in the name of preserving the Earth’s health and beauty for as long as possible.
Teresa Bradley, president and CEO of Race to Zero Waste, has been the key to its massive development. She has made countless improvements for the organization such as making zero waste opportunities more common in public spaces and helped develop new projects and sponsorship funds through the pandemic.
Last October, the group attended Lamon: The First Zero-Waste Filipino Food & Wine Summit event at the Southeast Community Center.
Bradley said she didn’t want people to focus on the negative things or ideas when it comes to waste, but rather the positive in how far people have come to reducing their amount of waste.
“Zero waste is love,” Bradley said. She has used Race to Zero Waste as a way to make recyclable supplies available to folks in need, create more jobs within the waste industry, and make recycling fun to the general public.
In relation to this advocacy, Skyline College also has groups that advocate for waste reduction and proper recycling. For example, in the Fireside Dining room in Building 6, there are trash bins that separate recycling, landfill waste, and compost.
In addition to that, a school work group called Earth Day Every Day (EDED), organized by faculty and students, does monthly events to help spread awareness about the impact of waste reduction. They also advise the student club, Students Advocating for Greener Environments (SAGE).
EDED reinvigorated the Grow Globe, the wooden sculpture on the third floor of Building 7, by taking out old plants that died in September and planting new ones.
Marisa Thigpen, Skyline’s program service coordinator and EDED member, said the objective of their group is to make the campus a better place not only for themselves, but for all the students attending.
Thigpen also talked about “wish-cycling”, the act of someone throwing a questionable item into the recycling bin, hoping that it is recyclable. One example of this are black plastic utensils that are widely-used on campus.
However, Yuting Duan, student ambassador for EDED, said that people should not throw the black plastic utensils in the recycling bin as they are unrecyclable, unlike the clear and white utensils.
In support of that, Green Matters, a blog site on climate action, says that black plastic is highly toxic, and because of its color, sorting machines at waste plants cannot accurately separate the black plastic from other garbage, which means it ends up piling in the landfill.
Duan also said that little changes to everyone’s everyday life–from using wooden compostable utensils, to bringing your own thermos everywhere–can help make an impact for the better.
In November, EDED will host an event entitled Talkin’ Trash and Fashion, a showcase where students display clothing, apparel, and jewelry made entirely out of waste material. The event is scheduled for Nov. 6, 10 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at the Post-Election Fair and Nov. 13 12:00-1:00 p.m. during college hours, all in Building 6.
