College campuses across Westchester County and the Hudson Valley are going green, offering classes on the environment and hosting special events to raise awareness.
“There”™s a new awareness and concern for the environment,” said Angelo Spillo, professor of environmental studies at Pace University”™s Pleasantville campus. “A lot of people are concerned for their well-being and what”™s happening in the future.”
Spillo, who also serves as advisor to the university”™s environmental club, said the school offers an environmental studies degree as well as an environmental sciences degree at the undergraduate level.
“It”™s becoming more and more popular,” Spillo said of the programs. “We have a good number of majors, about 16 or17 on the Pleasantville campus, and it seems to be growing.”
Spillo said while the environmental science degree is more focused on the hard sciences, such as chemistry and biology; the environmental studies degree “takes a broader approach based on the philosophy that our environmental problems go way beyond science and technology.”
Spillo said students who major in environmental studies can be valuable to businesses interested in being green companies.
“From a business perspective, companies have to contend with a lot of environmental issues ”“ they are mandated to do so,” Spillo said. “They need people within their facilities to advise them to save energy. They can save millions of dollars by implementing energy-saving systems.”
In addition to environmental clubs and courses, Spillo said a unique aspect of Pace”™s relationship to the environment is its on-campus farmhouse built in the 1800s. And: “We have hawks and owls and falcons right here on campus, with demonstrations on the open commons,” he said.
At the Westchester Community College (WCC) campus in Valhalla, the Native Plant Center educates the community about local flora: both planting it and caring for it.
“Planting is one way a person can help the environment,” said Brooke Beebe, director of the Native Plant Center. “It”™s so simple. They help the circle of life, native insects, butterflies, birds ”“ they all depend on native plants,”
Beebe said although the Native Plant Center does not offer courses for credit, there is a growing interest among students, professors and the community about being educated in the intricacies of the environment.
WCC offers several courses with an environmental focus, including in environmental science, pollution and human ecology.
“We do help students who are interested in majoring in environmental science or environmental studies when they transfer,” said Michael Priano of the WCC biology department.
Priano said new things have happened over the past year, including a group initiative of faculty, staff and administrators called “sustaining and greening our environment.”
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Priano said the group is “trying to get the word out how to better operate our campus in a green and sustainable way.”
“What I”™m hoping is that within the next 12 months we continue to map out a future that increases the sustainability of the operations at the college and ultimately includes sustainability as part of our curriculum so that we are helping young people understand the importance of planning not just for today but for the future,” Priano said.
SUNY New Paltz offers a degree in environmental geochemical science, an undergraduate environmental science major. The school also offers a minor in environmental studies.
“We have some very interesting courses in the program taught by a range of departments, and we”™re gathering more,” said David Clark, associate dean of the school of science and engineering. “We”™re finding that more and more faculty in diverse disciplines are getting more involved with environmental issues and want to include them in their courses.”
The University has partnered with Mohonk Mountain House to establish an organic farm close to campus where students go to do field work and learn about sustainable agriculture.
The Brook Farm, located on Mohonk Mountain House land, serves as a teaching tool: Students do research projects there, including chemical analysis of the soil.
Clark said there is also a major ongoing effort with “greening” the campus.
“As part of our campuswide recycling program, our students did trash audits,” Clark said. “They went through and actually sorted the trash and saw how much material was recyclable and what wasn”™t. They found that there was a lot of trash in the recycling and a lot of recycling in the trash.”
Clark said the students then came up with a plan to encourage recycling, including placing recycling stations at the ends of the hallways.
“It”™s been very effective,” Clark said. “The students took a lot of initiative.”
In addition, there is an energy audit under way in an effort to monitor energy consumption all over the New Paltz campus to identify where there appears to be excess use, then control it and reduce it.
“Students particularly realize that being young, they have much more of a stake in this,” Clark said.
New Rochelle”™s Iona College”™s campuswide Paper Conservation Campaign earned national recognition from the Campus Ecology Program of the National Wildlife Federation. Iona (as well as Pace and WCC) is a charter member of the Environmental Consortium of Hudson Valley Colleges and Universities, an organization whose mission is to help shape the future of the regional and global environment through collaboration, education and research.
“There are quite a lot of ways that Iona is really pushing the environmental agenda,” said Jerome Levkov, professor of chemistry.
Levkov wrote a book on the environment titled, “As the Earth Turns: Perspectives on Environmental Issues in the 21st Century,” published in 2002.
There are two different environmental organizations at Iona, including the Environmental Concerns Committee and IC Green, which was formed last spring.
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Last month, the college held “SOS Planet Earth” activities, including a day during which faculty from different disciplines presented various aspects related to the environment and a scientific debate on global warming.
A springtime Iona “green fair” featured environment-related activities, including exhibits on solar energy devices and hybrid cars.
Spillo, who has been teaching at Pace for the past 30 years, has been teaching environmental courses for the past decade.
“Al Gore has made global warming and climate change a household word,” Spillo said. “I think all of that comes into play.”
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