Hosting events from panels about cannabis to a no buy market, students on campus are getting engaged with the environment during Earth Week. Earth Week at SFSU is an annual celebration where organizations host various events to spread information about issues affecting different aspects of the environment.
This year’s events include a blood drive, a mobility event and a youth summit. David Mauricio Recendiz-Tostado, student director of the Environmental Resource Center, spoke about the ERC’s responsibilities hosting Earth Week.
“I think a diverse array [of events] to really show our environment is really interconnected into our social systems and the natural world,” Recendiz-Tostado said.
On Monday, April 20, the first event was focused around the realities of cannabis use and included conversations about the production and different sectors of the cannabis industry.
Tuesday’s No Buy Market in the student center lobby gave students a space to bring in and trade or recycle any miscellaneous, nonperishable items to help reduce waste. The ERC partnered with SCRAP SF, a non-profit in the city’s Bayview neighborhood that aims to keep art supplies affordable through donations and recycling.
Oscar Galarza, a fourth-year mechanical engineering major, spoke about the effects of textile waste and also the benefits of buying sustainably.
“When it comes to fashion and clothing, a lot of it gets wasted over time so it’s nice to buy secondhand and that way you’re not wasting as much clothes,” Galarza said. “You don’t need to buy extra stuff you can reuse instead of buying new.”
Today’s Blood Drive is a collaboration with Vitalant, a non-profit organization aimed to provide hospitals and patients with blood donated by volunteers safely. If a student makes an appointment and donates blood, they will be entered to have a chance to win $10,000 dollars Recendiz-Tostado.
Nestled within the Sol Patch Community Garden next to Mary Park Hall is another space where students can volunteer and learn about gardening, habitat preservation and food literacy at 2 p.m.
Amaelia Bringas, the Sol Patch community garden coordinator, has enjoyed working in the garden and hopes other students can enjoy it as well during Earth Week.
“I have been in this position since the fall, and it’s been [a] really cool experience just helping people get out in the environment and that’s something I feel a lot of people are craving,” Bringas said.
Thursday’s green mobility event on the Quad aims to provide information about environmental issues such as the harms traffic can pose, both affecting the climate and the environment and pedestrians as well.
Earth Week will conclude on Friday with a youth summit held in downtown San Francisco at Yerba Buena Gardens from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The youth summit will have various speakers and workshops for those attendance as well as career mixers.
Logan Hennessy, chair of the Climate Change Certificate Steering Committee, commented on the importance of Earth Week.
“In the environmental field we are more concerned about pretty important environmental subjects like species extinction and climate change are pretty big topics and subjects for people in my field, and [also] climate justice, environmental justice, these are super important top subjects… there is an invested interest that all students know about these things,” Hennessy said.
