UNA's Recycling Program: Efforts Towards a Sustainable University

Today's field trip got off to a rather inauspicious start. After meeting the students outside the university gate, Ana and I started off on foot in the direction of the recycling center. After walking several blocks, with 17 students and family members in tow, we realized our error: I thought that Ana knew where we were going and she thought that I knew! Alas, neither of us did. (Pat photographed me pointing the way.) We returned to the University and were escorted to the University's recycling center. As we got closer we saw the sign "UNA: Sostenible Universidad." As it turns out, we had arrived at a DIFFERENT center from the one Pat and I had visted last year. We were at the University's center, and the one I visited with last year's students belongs to the San Rafael Community, also nearby. Here is a website that describes that center: Asociación de Gestión Ambiental de San Rafael de Heredia, http://wastenet.landcover-projects.de/298.html. The one for the university is much smaller.

Waste management is important everywhere, but it is essential to note that different cultures have different relationships with their waste. The saying "one man's trash is another man's treasure" is certainly appropriate. An easy observation to make is the age of many everyday articles that are in use. Cars that might be considered by many in the US to be well past their useful life are abundant on the Costa Rican roads (but so are many newer models; Costa Rica has a very strong economy in comparison to most of Central America). My students have noted that some of these older cars run poorly and create a good bit of air pollution. Similarly, some of the furnishings in our apartment are worn but still servicable. A Holiday Inn or Marriot in the US might have discarded some of these pieces long ago. It is not surprising that the wealthier a nation, the more trash it generates.

In Costa Rica, recycling is not as much a part of the waste managment culture as it is in the US. That might be because disposable packaging, a luxury of wealthy nations, could be a relative newcomer to this rapidly growing country. Today, centers such as the one at the university and the one I visited last year with my students are working to increase waste management awareness among citizens. The program at UNA is working hard to educate faculty, staff and students about the importance of recycling within the greater waste management scheme. They are making progress and recently received the "blue flag" award for environmental stewardship. They also handle hazardous waste, organic wastes and other non-recyclables.

Within the Sostenable Universidad initiative, I found one of the most interesting aspects to be the calculation of the University's carbon footprint. They totaled vehicular miles, energy use, water use and other resource use and expressed it as equivalent hectares of forested land area, based on the amount of CO2 that could be absorbed by that area of trees. Their number was about four times too large, but it gave them a clear way of articulating the university's environmental impact and a clear goal to reach after improvement.

After our field trip, we returned to the classroom where students began preparing posters in both Spanish and English. Before we leave, we'll bring these posters to a Costa Rican secondary school and our students will work with their students to come to a mutual understanding of waste management. We define service learning as any activity where students both learn new things and share their experience with community members in a productive way. Our students will learn a lot about themselves in the process.

- Chuck