Health Class...

6/10/20 As the school year comes to a close, I have been reflecting on each class and what I have enjoyed about this past year. Although only a portion of it was in person, it was still a decent year. I had a great experience joining Zoom calls for a variety of classes, not stressing about upcoming tests, and having five day weekends. Yes. Five days. I achieved this by doing a total 12 hours of work on both Monday and Tuesday combined, and enjoying the rest of the week without stress. Of course, I had Zooms over these "long weekends”, however, other than that I could go for walks, work on my website, or talk on the phone with friends. Even right now, it is a Tuesday afternoon and I have completed all my work for the week (it was only about 4 hours because it’s nearly summer) and I am typing up a blog post that will be uploaded tomorrow. Today, I am going to look at one class in particular: Health Class.

No, it is not the type of health class you’re thinking of with “the video” and talks about drugs. This virus saved me from that. Because all of our learning was remote, we had to focus on a different topic, one that I find much more interesting: Sustainability. 

Yes, I got to do my passion for school assignments. #dreamscancometrue Anyways, not to hate on my teacher, but I wish he had a personality. He does not express an interest in the lives of his students like some other teachers do. He hardly ever even shared his own life with us, his students. 

I am going to take a quick pause just to say it’s not all his fault as we only had about 3 classes with him before the lockdown started. 

Back to the point. I agree on every level with this teacher. His words are so relatable and he thinks like I do. We both focus a lot on healthy, sustainable living. Each week he gave a video about Earth conscious living, with a few questions we had to answer about making sustainable actions.

I did not save the questions, however I saved my answers where I ended up sharing some cool, personal information. I thought they would be nice to provide. Here is health class 2020: 

We were asked about trash: “I try to be as environmentally conscious as possible. I am a part of SSC (Sustainable Sharon Coalition), a sustainability group for our town. For these reasons, I know a good amount about trash and what happens to it after it is thrown "away". A lot of trash goes to landfills which is obviously not good as it continues to pile at exponential rates. Recycling goes to a facility, however, I have heard that less than 10% of that actually gets recycled and the rest goes to a landfill too. I have also heard in the past that all of the trash in MA goes to an incinerator because there is such a space shortage. However, this is not any better because of the gases that are produced when the trash is burned. I don't know who specifically picks up the trash other than the person driving the trash truck. I personally try to live a lifestyle as low waste as possible. ”

“When you throw things away, they go into a recycling facility, incinerator, or deep hole called a landfill. The trash that doesn't go there goes into waterways and ecosystems. Then it sits there and breaks down while producing greenhouse gases for many many centuries. However, not all plastic can break down and will be on this planet essentially forever.” 

”Once again, trash ends up in a huge landfill or incinerator. The landfills are huge and these piles of trash can be as big as 500 ft tall and cover 700 acres of land. However, because landfills are always growing, those numbers will change. One of the worst things about landfills is the leachate, a mixture of liquids that collect in landfills and like trash, can run into our waterways. Also, I really appreciated that video as I am a huge fan of the story of stuff (and the story of plastic) project. There are many ways we can stop throwing things away. About a month ago, you sent an email about a webinar that was taking place. This morning and the Thursdays for the past four weeks, I have been waking up at 5:45 so I could watch the webinars live. I have found them very interesting. Today, they talked about the circular economy and plastics which I thought was super interesting and I believe it is the solution. I know the term "reduce, reuse, recycle" however that really isn't the answer especially on a systemic scale. Reduce is the first step. When given a choice, try to be involved as little as possible in the economy. We live with such a linear economy and people just keep buying and throwing away. Then reuse. This is the first part of a circular economy. Reuse what we have. Repair things to be reused. Reuse things others are done with. Then recycle. I do not believe this is the answer at all however I believe it is a better choice than sending something to a landfill as it gives waste a chance to become something new and have a second life. I have been trying to live a zero/low waste lifestyle. I don't know if it's possible to have absolutely zero waste, but if and when I buy plastics I try to only buy numbers one or two as I know these are the most easily recyclable. Yet, I still feel guilt making any waste whether that be trash, recycle, or food waste. I wish everything could be circular. That is the answer.”

“The phrase "reduce, reuse, recycle" means there is a process to how we should buy packaging. First, we need to reduce. We need to reduce what we really need. For example, nobody needs five different types of shampoo. That is a waste of bottles and a waste of resources because since they have more, they probably use more. At least more than they need. Then, reuse. Reusing is good, but it can be hard to find another use for every item that is packaged. However, using reusables is great for items that are needed. Then, when the above isn’t possible, recycle. This in itself is a process. Recycling is taking an item, and putting it through a process that will give it a second life. However, things like paper and plastics can only be recycled a few times before they become trash. They also just get down-cycled which is not good because then they have less value. On the contrary, glass and aluminum can be infinitely recycled. These items are really good to recycle because they save a lot of energy instead of using virgin materials. So, the recycling process: first figure out if the item can be recycled in your community (the recycling sign is not reliable). Then you have to clean the product. For example, oil cannot be recycled with plastic or glass. So if you have a bottle of olive oil, you have to rinse it out before recycling it. If you don't rinse it, it could contaminate other recyclables. All three of these are important to save resources and energy. It is also important to keep your carbon footprint down. ” 

“The story of bottled water taught me and reminded me of a lot. It said that tap water was just as good as bottled water and was even rated better in taste tests. I thought that was really cool. But then why do companies like Fiji and Poland Springs exist? It's all about a few things. 1. Packaging. People see the packaging of a bottle and instead of seeing the resources and energy that went into making that one bottle, they see a pretty picture of nature or something else convincing them they are drinking wonderful, clean, fresh water when really any water can taste like that. 2. Convenience. A lot of people don't feel like taking a bottle around with them to fill up. Especially a heavier one like metal. It is so easy to just walk around, find a bottle at your destination, and get rid of it once you're done using it that one time. I learned the importance of boycotting bottled water and I am committed to avoiding it whenever possible.” 

“I can think of a lot of other examples of wasteful industries that ignore reduce and reuse concepts. For example, the food industry that packages everything harms animals and uses chemicals on crops. However, I think the industry that makes an insane amount of waste is the fashion industry. Here's an example: H&M. This company in my opinion is one of the most unsustainable brands there are. Not only do they make fast fashion that is produced by people who don't even get paid the minimum wage (which in those countries is like $3), but they produce things so quickly and people keep buying their clothes so they don't know what to do with the clothes that are no longer trending. Also, because the clothing is made so cheaply, it will easily fall apart. For these reasons, it continuously ends up in landfills. However, this brand completely green-washes its consumers. People buy things because they slap a recycle sign on it and they think they are an eco-friendly brand. This company is luckily working on becoming more sustainable, and do have a recycled clothing line, but yet again they forgot to reduce and reuse.” 

“Skipping the reduce and reuse steps in favor of recycling alone is unsustainable for many reasons. It cannot continue indefinitely at its current rate because it does not save as many resources as reducing and reusing do. Also, because most items either don't get recycled or simply get down-cycled, we would still be contributing significantly to the amount of waste that ends in landfills. A plastic water bottle could be down-cycle into plastic packaging that would then be thrown away or even worse end up in an ecosystem, harming animals living there. Recycling is basically just a way to promote plastic packaging, but save some energy while doing it because the resources are already there. A lot of people claim to live sustainably just because they recycle. And clearly, we can't get ourselves out of this mess by only recycling. We rely on single on single use items even though in most cases that is unnecessary. There is always a way to get items zero or at least low waste. Whether that means reducing a product you don't need, (ask yourself: do I really need that meat that comes in plastic?), reusing (ex: bring reusable bags to the grocery store), or as a very last resort, recycle it. I try to only buy numbers 1 and 2 plastics as they are the most easily recyclable.” 

“The "green movement" depicts the responsibility for taking care of the planet supposedly on the shoulders of the consumers, and it often costs them more to do so because we live in a society where it is so easy to just blame anyone except yourself. In fact, the term "zero waste" actually was intended for marketing and packaging use in hopes it would reduce waste on a systemic level. And, a lot of essentials for life are unsustainably produced. So, it is the manufacturers responsibility, not the consumer.”

“To make a change, citizens have to come together to demand rules that work. 1) They dive deep into ideas that could improve the lives of everyone. 2) They worked together until the problem was solved. 3) They took action. They were just bystanders who tried avoiding wasteful packaging, they would yell and protest and make our needs known.”

“I care deeply about sustainability, more specifically packaging and where my products come from. I do a lot of research about where my products come from. I know during this pandemic a lot of people have been shopping. However, I have not. Because I believe in "eco-minimalism". This means when I have a chance not to buy something, I don't. One of my favorite quotes I recently came across was, "the most environmentally friendly product is the one you didn't buy". I am understanding that because it is so true. It is so hard to find a product, make sure it is organic, or vegan, or made in the USA, or ethically sourced (making sure that less privileged people weren't underpaid for making it), or so many more. That means instead of having to take all of those things into consideration, just buy nothing at all. I share these ideas with my friends which is why I think I am a communicator and try to explain thoroughly the importance of sustainability for ourselves and our planet.”

If you really read all of this. Then damn, you impress me. I know this was long, however I wish my health teacher will come across this some day. Not to “dis” on my fellow classmates, however I don’t know if any of them put in the same amount of time, effort, and interest to write thoughtful responses like I did. I simply wish my teacher would take the time (or just a minute or two) so I could know my words were heard. I guess that’s why I have a blog.

Check out this video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6M-hVw0ywIA&t=2s