Students from around the world calculated their class mean and standard deviations for their footprints and posted them on our world map.
Do you see differences across the globe? If so, why do you think those differences exist?
Did you use the calculator to try to reduce your footprint down to the average from a citizen of another country? What changes would you have to make to lower your footprint in this way? Are you going to try and take some of these actions in your daily life?
Student Footprints >
Using Reusable Plates and Containers at School Cafeterias
While reading through some of the posts, I began thinking of all of the waste that comes from school cafeterias. According to the School Nutrition Association, about 30.4 million students buy lunch everyday (https://schoolnutrition.org/AboutSchool … endsStats/) From my experience, the average lunch has a carton of milk or juice of some sort. At my old school, students simply threw away their milk cartons instead of recycling them, because they didn't realize that they could be recycled. I think that we should inform kids across the nation that these cartons can be recycled. Doing this would decrease waste, as well as encourage kids from a young age to recycle things. We also should consider using reusable plates instead of paper ones at lunch. Some schools serve food on paper plates, which is convenient. However, most of these plates are thrown away, which creates an abundance of waste for the environment . Instead, cafeterias should switch to normal plates that can be used everyday, and would save the globe from a lot of extra waste. Cafeterias could ins tall a dishwashing system, which would save a lot of extra paper plates from being used! Imagine how much waste 30.4 million students create in just one meal. By implementing some simple policies, we could decrease the waste by an enormous amount!
This makes a good point. Even though at my school we recycle, many people don't because they either forget or just don't care. I think a dishwasher would be a great idea, but don't you think the constant usage of the dishwasher would cause the carbon footprint to increase? I think your idea is great; this is just one question that came to mind. What if students were encouraged to bring their own water bottles to fill with drinks instead of using the ones provided? They could even bring their own plates (that may be a little too extreme). I really like your idea and hope this is something that schools will consider.
You are so right. I believe there should definitely be more education to kids about what to recycle, how to recycle, etc.! Schools should also be making sure recycle bins are accessible! Backing off of Emma's idea, when kids bring their own refillable water bottles, there should be some sort of prize system to help motivate them, in addition to increasing their understanding of the importance of keeping our Earth clean.
Hi Emma! I think that yes, it would use water, but if the school implemented conservative water policies, in the end the planet would be benefitted. Also, i agree with Sofia. I think that having some sort of reward system, or motivation system would be a great idea to help the planet reduce waste!