This past Tuesday was Earth Day, and in the spirit of “going green” Plymouth State saw its share of events to coincide with moving towards a more sustainable future. First, on Sunday April 20, Common Ground hosted their first annual Earth Jam event, which was powered completely by solar power. On Tuesday, we saw an Environmental Sustainability Fair, which featured cars run by vegetable oil, informative booths on various sustainability topics, and trash that was sifted through and sorted by members of Common Ground.
Also on Sunday, Sean Greenlaw, the Treasurer of Spring Fling, went before Student Senate requesting $3,000 from reserves to fund a bio-diesel generator in efforts to make PSU’s favorite event run a bit more sustainable. According to Greenlaw, Spring Fling’s mission this year “has been following the University mission of going green.”
The steps toward a more sustainable future at PSU are not cheap. A regular short sleeve shirt costs $3.25 for a student org to purchase. To buy an organic shirt, on the other hand, it costs $4.25, a dollar more. This may not seem like much, but if the shirts are being bought in bulk of 200 or 300 shirts, the one extra dollar adds up very fast.
Also, on the subject of reusable water bottles, the cheapest reusable water bottles we found were individually $0.79. This is not a bad price, but if you are trying to quench hundreds of peoples thirst, buying 24 packs of Poland Spring for under $6.00 is a more fiscally conservative and convenient, alternative. This does mean that the bottles would most likely be tossed into the trash at the end of the night.
These have just been a couple of examples of the cost differences between regular items and more sustainable items that student orgs can choose between. Generally, student orgs choose the cheaper, less sustainable items due to the amount they are allocated each year. Student Senate had many complaints about Greenlaw bringing Spring Fling’s request before them. Some complained that Greenlaw waited until the last minute to come before them, even though the prospective company never got a quote to Spring Fling until Thursday, April 17. Some had a problem giving them $3,000 due to the amount they bring in with ticket and alcohol sales. The thing is, Spring Fling doesn’t start selling tickets until April 28, and the money was needed the time the request was made.
Student Senate denied Spring Flings request for $3,000, and instead were granted $1,500 towards their strive to “go green.” While this is a decent start, we here at The Clock feel that Student Senate should have awarded Spring Fling for their efforts. We live in a time where “going green” is a noticeable step in the right direction, but it also is not cheap. Student Senate had the money and the means to ease Spring Fling into making this first step towards leaving less of a footprint, but that help was stunted due to their all to critical eye.
~The Clock Staff