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Students at SCNU have taken concrete steps to promote sustainability on campuses, such as recycling old clothes, going green with plastic bottles and organizing activities to raise environmental awareness in the community. As Earth Day 2024 comes, let’s mark the day by taking action for being green on campus and make every day Earth Day.
Recycling old clothes
Old clothes recycling is aimed at giving new life the used clothes, and it has been a tradition of the university which was first initiated in 2017, according to the Green Association of SCNU, a student association and organizer of the activity. Booths are usually set up to collect used clothes across campuses each year, and they will last for two days each time.
The setting up of clothes recycling booths is welcomed by students and faculty. Participants said that it is wasteful to throw away old clothes. By participating in the old clothes recycling activity, they can contribute to the environmental protection.
Zhong Jiatong, an undergraduate student of grade 2023, participated in organizing the recent old clothes recycling activity at the Shipai campus. As to how the collected clothes will be recycled, she said that they would be sent to a special clothes sorting center, where the collected cloths would be turned into recycled cotton, soundproofing cotton and so on, thus promoting environmental protection.
Booths are usually set up to collect old clothes across campuses each year.
Going green with plastic bottles
To coincide with the theme for Earth Day 2024 "Planet vs. Plastics", activities of going green with plastic bottles have been held at the university town campus, in which students transformed waste plastic bottles into potted plants and pen holders to reduce plastic waste and advocate environmental protection.
In the activity of making potted plants from plastic water bottles, students can pick up seeds and soil from a designated green booth and grow plants in waste plastic bottles. They can also use colouring pencils to paint their own bottles and leave their palm prints on a picture.
In the activity of making pen holders from plastic water bottles, students went to a nearby primary school and instructed children to cut the waste plastic bottles and transform them into pen holders. To turn plastic trash into treasure, children were also taught how to decorate their handmade pen holders.
A girl happily holds a pen holder she made from a waste plastic bottle.
These activities have not only made the recycling activities fun and increase student participants' motivation, but also provide them an creative way for plastic recycling.
Raising environmental awareness
By organizing activities to improve people’s environmental knowledge on campus, students of SCNU commit to raise people's awareness of environmental protection.
Chen Peishi, an undergraduate student of grade 2022, together with her team members from the Green Association, organized such an activity at the Nanhai campus. They decided on environmental protection as the theme of the game, attracting a lot of people. Participants learned about garbage sorting through a ring tossing game. They also recalled their passion for environmental protection from the poetry conference on the topic of nature.
Participants learn about garbage sorting through a ring tossing game.
Chen said that these activities took an approach to learning through enjoyment. She was glad to see so many people participating in environmental protection activities, which also strengthened her determination to continue to design more green activities.
Beyond campus, students of SCNU actively become volunteers in environmental education in nearby primary schools and communities. Xu Qilan, an undergraduate student of grade 2022, is the head of the environmental education team. She said that they would educate primary and secondary school students about waste classification, food safety, air pollution and other common environmental topics. Every time she hears children praising the course, she is filled with a sense of accomplishment. Because she feels that environmental education is meaningful, which can raise the awareness of environmental protection among the next generation.
Xu Qilan, head of the environmental education team, teaches environmental knowledge in primary school.
Source from SCNU News Center
Translated by Kuang Xinyi, Zeng Wenting
Proofread by Edwin Baak
Edited by Li Jianru
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