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I think part of being an environmental
professional and an environmental professor
is to really engage students to think
about their own activities.
As I’ve mentioned, my undergraduate students
in the GUR class take their ecological footprint,
and for many of them that’s their first
realization that ‘Gosh, eating meat
makes me have a higher footprint’
And I don’t make them, or suggest that they,
become vegetarians, necessarily, but I think
it does gives them some insight into
the types of activities that might be more
environmentally sensitive than others.
And one exercise that I’ve done consistently
in my Introduction to Environmental Policy
class is I have my students keep a
‘body burdens journal.’
Body burdens is a line of research that
really talks about the toxics that we have
in our bodies, and it’s through exposure
to synthetic chemicals, things that
make your shampoo bubble and things
that make your soap smell really nice,
many of them come from
synthetically-derived chemicals.
And students just assume ‘Shampoo will get me
clean, so it’s great,’ and I really encourage them
to read labels and I have them keep a
body burdens journal and over the course
of the week I have them look at what they wear,
what they wash themselves with, what they eat
and how they get around campus
and they realize, ‘I’m exposed to a dozen,
maybe two dozen, different types of chemicals
that I can’t pronounce on a daily basis.’
And I have students research chemicals
from their shampoo bottle and realize,
‘Wow, there’s nothing natural in my
coconut-smelling shampoo.’
And I think it’s a real eye-opener for them
to realize that they can make better choices
for their own bodies that are also better choices
for the environment.