2008 Woodie Awards
Politicize This: Environment to Loyola, where are the recycling bins?
Andrew Zaleski
Issue date: 10/7/08 Section: Opinion
Loyola doesn't mess around when it comes to being environmentally conscious.
When the East Residence Hall - since re-dubbed Flannery O'Connor Hall - first opened, Loyola eagerly touted it as the school's first green building. Complete with a geothermal heating and cooling system and energy-saving appliances, the relatively new residence hall is tough on environmental waste and oh-so-soft on the ozone. Oh, and Flannery O'Connor also boasts a green roof, whatever that means. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Villanova (but not really - smoke is bad for the environment).
When Loyola installed a solar panel this past summer as a way to generate environment-loving energy for Butler and Hammerman dormitories, a great victory was won against lovers of pollution everywhere. Take that, Halliburton.
When EnviroRide popped up on campus this year, students graciously embraced the new car service as the solution to their gas-guzzling weekend "excursions."
"What's that Mercedes doing on York Road?" "Oh, you know - just saving the planet."
When the campus transitioned its old recycling program into a newer, single-stream recycling program, Loyola proudly displayed its latest environmentally-driven endeavor. We stuck it to the big, bad garbage trucks and demonstrated to manufacturers everywhere that we would no longer fear their need to package goods in glass, cardboard and plastic. Hah! With single-stream recycling, I can put my Pepsi bottles and my Easy Mac boxes in the same container. It makes saving the planet feel so good.
One question, though: Where did all the recycling bins go?
During my first year at Loyola, it was refreshing to see recycling bins scattered around the campus. Recycling bins were in Boulder; recycling bins were in the college center; recycling bins were even conveniently placed along the brick walkway that runs parallel to the Quad. This was a huge improvement over my high school's recycling initiative, which mainly consisted of round, blue tubs scattered throughout a school building, rendered utterly useless when the senior class found it funnier to use the tubs as freshmen containment units instead of paper-recycling bins. Naturally, when I came to Loyola and found that people actually cared about recycling, I was rather appreciative.
When the East Residence Hall - since re-dubbed Flannery O'Connor Hall - first opened, Loyola eagerly touted it as the school's first green building. Complete with a geothermal heating and cooling system and energy-saving appliances, the relatively new residence hall is tough on environmental waste and oh-so-soft on the ozone. Oh, and Flannery O'Connor also boasts a green roof, whatever that means. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Villanova (but not really - smoke is bad for the environment).
When Loyola installed a solar panel this past summer as a way to generate environment-loving energy for Butler and Hammerman dormitories, a great victory was won against lovers of pollution everywhere. Take that, Halliburton.
When EnviroRide popped up on campus this year, students graciously embraced the new car service as the solution to their gas-guzzling weekend "excursions."
"What's that Mercedes doing on York Road?" "Oh, you know - just saving the planet."
When the campus transitioned its old recycling program into a newer, single-stream recycling program, Loyola proudly displayed its latest environmentally-driven endeavor. We stuck it to the big, bad garbage trucks and demonstrated to manufacturers everywhere that we would no longer fear their need to package goods in glass, cardboard and plastic. Hah! With single-stream recycling, I can put my Pepsi bottles and my Easy Mac boxes in the same container. It makes saving the planet feel so good.
One question, though: Where did all the recycling bins go?
During my first year at Loyola, it was refreshing to see recycling bins scattered around the campus. Recycling bins were in Boulder; recycling bins were in the college center; recycling bins were even conveniently placed along the brick walkway that runs parallel to the Quad. This was a huge improvement over my high school's recycling initiative, which mainly consisted of round, blue tubs scattered throughout a school building, rendered utterly useless when the senior class found it funnier to use the tubs as freshmen containment units instead of paper-recycling bins. Naturally, when I came to Loyola and found that people actually cared about recycling, I was rather appreciative.
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