Environmentally Friendly Back-to-School Tips

Recently, the World Wildlife Fund offered their suggestions on how to save the Earth while going back to school. This is what they had to say:

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As kids and parents make back-to-school lists, they might want to get educated on some environmentally friendly ways to prepare for fall classes. Here are 10 tips the World Wildlife Fund offers to help keep backpacks green:

1) See if there are things, such as pencils and pens, left over from last year that can be used this fall.

2) Look for school supplies—folders, notebooks, staples—made of recycled materials. Using recycled products helps save landfill space and cut pollution. The EPA has found that recycling reduces water pollution by one-third and air pollution by 75 percent.

3) Try finding back-to-school deals on the Web. Ordering school supplies online or by phone saves you a trip to the store as well as the fuel needed to drive from store to store.

4) Look for the FSC label on pencils and paper. Many paper products are made from trees specifically grown and harvested for papermaking, thus sparing delicate rainforest ecosystems. The Forest Stewardship Council certifies that wood and paper products are grown and managed responsibly.

5) Purchase supplies with minimal packaging. Packaging makes up about a third of the garbage that piles up in landfills. Also, less processing and packaging means less energy goes into production, and less global warming pollution is created.

6) Brown bag meals and avoid plastic. Pack school lunches in brown, unbleached, recycled paper bags whenever possible. And if your child has a favorite superhero, there's a good chance the character is printed on a re-usable lunchbox.

7) Prepare lunches using local produce. Be aware of the distances food travels and the emissions necessary to ship and truck it there. Although broccoli is grown at nearby farms, the ones that shoppers pick up at the supermarket traverse an average distance of 1,800 miles.

8) Refill water bottles. Don't throw them away. One and a half million tons of plastic are used to bottle water every year. Such large-scale manufacturing and disposal of water bottles can release toxic chemicals into the environment.

9) Look for laptops made by companies working to reduce their global emissions. The ENERGY STAR sticker is a good tip-off that a product is compliant with EPA guidelines. Some backpacks even have built-in solar panels to provide an eco-friendly way to power laptops. Also, turn off your computer and monitor when not in use.

10) Walk or bike to school, not only to get exercise but also to benefit the environment. By burning calories walking, you and your child don’t burn a vehicle's gasoline and thus do your part to help reduce global warming. Surely, the PE instructor will approve.

http://www.livescience.com/environment/070821_green_school.html

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I think that the above list is stupid. I LIKE the environment, and LIKE my air and water to be clean. I don't think that any of the things the WWF is recommending will do anything to improve the world. So allow me to post my own ten point list:


Dr. Urchin's Environmentally Friendly Tips for Going Back to School

1) Plant flowers in pots and in garden rows around your house. They look pretty and will make useful school projects later in the year.

2) Organize your fellow students to go clean up the neighborhood park. It's in YOUR neighborhood, and if you don't help clean it, nobody will.

3) If you have a few gallons of water contaminated with lead, zinc, copper, molybdenum, or other toxic metals, don't dump it in the local stream or pond.

4) Get your dad to help you develop in your garage a way to make biodiesel fuel cheaply out of grass clippings. It may not HELP the air quality if people use this stuff, but it won't hurt, all that grass is currently going to waste, and you are probably going to be very very rich if this works. If it doesn't it still will make a really good school project.

5) Get your classmates and a teacher to help you make a water garden at the pool. It's useful for biology class, looks pretty, and will be fun at the end of the year when you push fellow students into the water, then dance around in the pool yourself. Oh, and it will take some carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, too. I forgot to mention that part.

6) Use pencils rather than pens, except when writing in a science lab notebook. Pencils can be erased; pens can't. Pens require white-out, which is more expensive than a rubber eraser. I'm not sure how this helps the environment, but I'm sure I could justify it if I tried. Maybe by pointing out the volatile chemicals in white out? My real reason is that you can work faster with a pencil, and teachers will find it easier to grade.

7) Do your fricking homework. You are a useless lump of human waste if you just sit there picking your nose all day. I'm sure that doing your homework can help save the environment, too. But you won't know how it helps, unless you do that homework, will you?

8 ) Go volunteer with someone in your community. If you are a high school student, then there are elementary school students who really need some tutoring learning how to read. Your city probably has things like "farmer's markets" or something like that, where they just need someone to set up and take down the event aftewards, or tell people where to go. Why aren't you helping out, if you care so much about saving the world?

9) Don't sell or take drugs. You are a useless lump of human waste if you do, just like in item #7. And whacked out druggies never save the world. If you had been studying your history rather than snorting coke, you would know that there isn't one single example of a great drug user who also has made a real difference. Instead, they go to rallies to save the environment, shout and scream, and take some drugs while there. And nothing happens.

10) Get a fricking job. People can only save the world when they have money to do so, and nobody has money if they don't work, contrary to what Paris Hilton might think.




I think my advice is more useful to the world than the WWF's advice. Certainly, my suggestions will do more to help your environment locally. And you know what? That's really the only one you can affect, and therefore the only one that matters. Love the nearest, not the furthest.