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Exposure provides a forum for student groups and area non-profits at Michigan State University and the Greater Lansing area. On the show, you'll hear discussions about the groups themselves as well as the relevant issues of today.
This is exposures on Impact 89 FM.
Luca:W DBM East Lansing.
Tessa Kresch:The show that lets you know about everything that goes on at the MSU campus that you otherwise might not know about. Tune in every Sunday at 9 AM. I'm your host, Tessa Kresch. Welcome to exposure. Hello.
Tessa Kresch:Hello. And welcome back to exposure. You are listening to season 14. I'm your host, Tessa Kresch. Earth Day is right around the corner, and what better time than now to talk about sustainability?
Tessa Kresch:Joining me today is the Sustainable Spartans, a student led organization focused on making MSU more sustainable through implementing sustainability projects that help educate and inspire fellow Spartans. Thank you guys so much for joining me today. Thanks for having us.
Ben:Thanks for having us. Happy to be here.
Tessa Kresch:Yeah. Of course. So could you guys start by introducing yourselves?
Ben:Hi. My name is Ben Adams. I'm a 4th year in Biosystems Engineering, and I'm currently the vice president for Sustainable Spartans.
Chloe:My name is Chloe Fry Anthony. I'm a 4th year. I'm an environmental studies and sustainability major with an additional major in psychology, and I'm currently the director of events.
Luca:Hi. My name is Luca Corneal. I am also a 4th year in environmental studies and sustainability who is minoring in science technology, environment and public policy, and geographic information systems. I am currently the project manager for Sustainable Spartans.
Tessa Kresch:Fantastic. I know I gave a little bit of an introduction of what the club is, but I want to hear from you guys. How would you explain Sustainable Spartans?
Ben:So you have a good introduction. So we're a project based club. We have regular weekly meetings where we generally are working on our projects, and those are related to sustainability and can be anything from a pollinator garden or green wall as we've done in the past to projects like we're doing currently, such as our consumption education campaign, where we are making social media posts and posters and also a zine that we'll print out. So projects that range from small, doable in a couple weeks to ones that take the entire semester or the entire year. And in our meetings, we'll also have sustainability in the news where a member or an e board member will pick an article about a topic relating to sustainability and share it at the meeting, then we'll have a discussion on that.
Luca:I would say we strive to be as much of a community organization as possible. A lot of people think that we're kind of geared just towards sustainability majors, but we are very much open to people from, well, all walks of life. It doesn't we strive to be a club that is open to all of MSU and beyond.
Chloe:We even sometimes, for things like events, have members outside of the community who just see our Instagram. So, for example, we had an owner of a refillery ask if they could join us in some beeswax making wrap, and we allow those people to come too. In addition to the meetings, we also have fun events outside of those.
Tessa Kresch:That's awesome. I'm curious how you guys got involved with the club. Mhmm.
Ben:Yeah. So I've been interested in sustainability for a while. I took a class in high school, an IB environmental science class, and that really jump started my interest in sustainability. So I knew I wanted a major related to that, and I met the then president of the club on Zoom during my freshman year, which was all online. And I jumped on their pollinator garden project and saw that through, and that was a really good experience despite it being completely virtual.
Ben:Although I did get to see the fruits of that when we got to install it the following fall, which is fall of 2021. And they encouraged me to apply for eboard, and here I am.
Chloe:For me, I've always been passionate about climate change and conservation. So So when I got to MSU, I wanted to find a club that would be able to help me pursue those passions. And I basically just looked on, I think, Involve at State, the website, and just looked through all the clubs. And Sustainable Spartans was there, and I decided to join. And then after a year, I ended up on the eboard, and now we're here.
Luca:For me, I kinda found sustainable experience through well, my freshman year of college was, COVID year, and pretty much was sick and tired of
Luca:being locked in a room, looking through a screen all day. And the College of Ag and Natural Resources was doing a student mentorship program, so I kinda signed up for that to get some advice, and my mentor threw out a whole list of student organizations, and Sustainable Spartans was a part of that. Next fall, I started attending the meetings and got really involved,
Luca:particularly with the Green Roof project, which is still something that's ongoing, possibly shifting to a new form. And at the end of the year, the president at that time kinda came up and talked to me about a position on the e board.
Luca:And I was a little unsure it, but he talked me into it. And now here I am.
Tessa Kresch:So you guys all have a little a passion for sustainability. I'm curious what kind of practices you have in your day to day life that strive towards sustainability.
Chloe:I'm really big on upcycling. I took a class. I can't remember the name, but we had to do a project based on sustainability. I chose to take all my trash and try to reuse it and form into something else. And ever since then, I've kinda taken on the practice of I do not buy something unless I can transform it into something else and keep it.
Chloe:And I also have all sorts of other things I do, such as mostly walking or I have a dog, so I use compostable poop bags. Things like that.
Tessa Kresch:I love the idea of only buying something that you can transform into something else. It's saving the world and your money.
Chloe:Yeah. Yeah.
Ben:I have to say for me, conscious consumption as well is a big one. You save money that way, as you said. I also bike everywhere or walk everywhere. And on top of being good exercise, it is sustainable or more sustainable than driving, of course. So I really enjoy doing that as well, and that's something that I've just always done.
Luca:I know that you 2 already said this, but conscious conception.
Luca:Well, I'm we're all college kids here, so being frugal is something that I feel like is just a good thing for everyone. So
Luca:I generally just don't buy something unless I know I need it. I would say I'm also very big on trying to use more sustainable means of transportation. For example, I bike pretty much everywhere even in the winter, even though it looks like congestion. Horrible.
Luca:But yeah.
Tessa Kresch:Do it for the world. Yeah. I think a lot of people do need a reminder to be a little bit more conscious when purchasing things because it's hard to avoid. Back to what the organization does. What kind of issues does the projects that you do aim to tackle?
Chloe:We are very diversified in that. We basically have our personal interest as everyone does, but we make sure that the member's gonna say. And at the beginning of the year, we try to get a gauge on that, and then we pursue projects that are the most, full of passion. We have done things like fast fashion, conservation, invasive species, energy. Pretty much anything you can can think of, we try to go for.
Ben:And so our current project is perfect for that since we're making social media posts and posters that have to do with various different topics to educate people on sustainable practices or certain sustainability facts or just things like that. So if somebody is interested in the different aspects of sustainability as someone else, they can both work on our current project and make a poster on 2 completely different topics. We're interested in and our members are interested in.
Tessa Kresch:What are some of those topics?
Ben:I'm going to hopefully go into something related to renewable energy after I graduate. So energy is a big one for me. I love learning about anything related to renewable energy and specifically bioenergy, although I'll not get too technical or too specific. And as I said before, I like to bike a lot, and that's a way to save energy. So sustainable transportation and something that I tend to think about is that everything in terms of sustainability is connected in some way.
Ben:So when you're biking, you're saving energy, but that also is connected to, like, land use planning. And if we have more bike lanes, for instance, more people would be able to bike or something like that. So those two topics, like saving energy and also biking or having better bike infrastructure are connected in that way.
Chloe:For me, I'm most passionate about conservation. I'm actually, like, going to school for a specialization in IBIO, which is kind of essentially, like, zoology, those types of things. So I'm really into saving animals. I'm an animal lover, and I also love using sustainability to be creative through things like DIY, upcycling, making things.
Luca:For me, I'm still very much trying to figure out what I wanna do with my degree once I graduate, but I think I have a particular interest on building more sustainable infrastructure and trying to influence that by creating more environmentally friendly policies. So kind of thinking right now, after I round off my degree and my minor, I'll get
Luca:a job for a few years, save up, then go back to grad school here, where there's a program that is a dual doctorate in environmental science and environmental law, and gun for that. So
Tessa Kresch:So what drives you guys to do this kind of work?
Luca:For me, originally, it didn't start out with the environment and sustainability. My big interest as a kid for a long time was space, but then I kinda realized, oh, wait a minute. To actually get out there, you have to go through a lot of things, and there's a lot of strict screening processes to become an astronaut. So I'm probably not gonna make my way through that. And even if I do, I'm consigning myself to be locked in a metal tube for years on end before I can even get anywhere.
Luca:Okay. That's not appealing. And then, oh, 2010 hits. And, oh my god, everything in the Gulf of Mexico is dying from a giant oil spill. And wait wait a minute.
Luca:This is common? We do this on a regular basis? What the act what the heck? You know? So and that kind of kicked off that whole thing, and one thing led to another.
Luca:And, yeah, then it kind of kicked off a whole sustainability
Luca:and environmental interest that's continued to this day.
Tessa Kresch:I love that story.
Chloe:Mine's actually fairly similar. I remember learning in elementary school about recycling and all the Earth Day activities we would do, and I remember being so upset about the gulf oil spill and how the animals were affected and how they had to use certain soap over it. And ever since then, I've just been so passionate about saving them and caring about the world.
Ben:I'd say mine is slightly different from a young age. I love geography. I love looking at maps and looking at how the Earth's surface changed over time. Like, what are we doing to the Earth's surface? Why are we changing it this much?
Ben:We're affecting the planet in crazy ways. That made me see certain things we're doing and how and and why like, basically, I asked myself, why are we doing these things to our planet? In addition to that, the environmental science class I took my senior year of high school, we got to research a different topic, or our teacher would have us read an article at the beginning of class every day about a different topic. So I was exposed to a variety of sustainability related topics through that. So that was how I got into it.
Ben:And then one big reason for what drives me is to see so many people interested in these topics and so many people passionate and willing to to learn about it and to help each other succeed and and work together to try and benefit the Earth.
Tessa Kresch:So I saw something about the green wall initiative. Can you tell me a little bit about what that is?
Ben:So the green wall, as you may have seen walking through campus, it is on the bridge that is between the stadium and the library. There are plants in boxes on the sides of the bridge, and it's a very popular spot for graduation photos and things like that. And it's just a really pretty bridge, and that was done by members of our club in the past, a few years before our time. They applied for a grant from Ford and won it for this project and we're able to implement that. That was one of the biggest projects the club has done, and we're currently trying to expand upon this and do related projects such as a green roof project where we've been looking at different places on campus where we could incorporate green roofs, which have a plethora of benefits for the environment.
Ben:Well, not only can green roofs provide habitat for native plants and pollinators, like, on top of buildings where they wouldn't otherwise be. Green roofs can also reduce the amount of energy needed to cool buildings down.
Luca:I would also like to mention that the green wall is also a dedicated memorial space to the previous director of sustainability who passed in 2021.
Ben:Yeah. So Amy Butler so the green wall was dedicated to Amy Butler who was a previous director of sustainability at Michigan State who sadly passed away from cancer.
Tessa Kresch:Oh, well, that's really beautiful. What other notable projects have you guys been a part of?
Ben:I've also been a part of the pollinator garden project. So behind Shaw Hall by the red cedar, there's a pollinator garden that was done, from a grant from IPF, which is infrastructure planning and facilities. Myself and several other members of the club worked on that, as I said, mostly virtual through Zoom. Had to coordinate everything that way. So that was difficult, and then we got to implement that in the fall of 2021.
Ben:That was a large project as well. And most recently, we got we applied for an exhibition at the MSU Museum called Food Fight, and we applied with a proposal for a piece relating to food waste. And our piece, which got accepted, is called the price of pretty produce, and it's essentially a market cart where the visitor to the museum or whoever's visiting the museum walks up and visualizes the amount of food or amount of produce that ends up wasted before being at the supermarket to begin with and shows the unintended cost and the invisible cost of of this part of our food system. So, basically, there's a scale and you take a certain amount of produce and put it on one side of the scale and have to remove some of that to put on the other side, meaning, like, you're paying for all of it, but you don't actually get all of it.
Chloe:Essentially, a visualization of food waste for when you buy it from a store.
Luca:To clarify, this waste occurs because big agriculture corporations, when they're selling us produce, a lot of it actually ends up. For example, like, when you picture a carrot, you picture a long, like, cylindrical thing that ends in a point. But most carrots actually aren't that. They're actually, like, kind of like think of a mini tree branch with many different tendrils sprouting off of it. Oh, yeah.
Luca:90% of carrots don't end up in the stereotypical shape that we think of.
Tessa Kresch:Percent.
Luca:In fact, baby carrots came from basically figuring out a way to deal with all those other carrots, and basically they get reshaped into baby carrots.
Chloe:Wow.
Luca:But most other produce isn't that lucky. So it just gets pitched and wasted.
Tessa Kresch:Wow. That is really interesting. 90%. Alright. Have you touched on all of the projects that you wanted to, or are there more you wanna highlight?
Ben:Oh, so our current project that we've talked about, our consumption campaign, overconsumption campaign, we also applied for funding from the office of sustainability for this and got accepted for this project. And I touched on it before, but we're making social media posts, a zine, and posters that we will post around campus to educate students on overconsumption and other topics as well, like energy, food waste, water use, and that is our our current project.
Chloe:Design. You can call it a zine or a zine. We it's basically a homemade magazine. So we are using old magazine clippings, and then we are taking pieces of paper, folding them in half, and educating as well as making an art piece out of reasons to consume less, just in general, such as fast fashion or not wasting food. And then for social media, we're kind of giving ideas on how to upcycle or how to do actions that make you consume less.
Chloe:So everything goes back to the less consumption, but in different ways and different formats.
Tessa Kresch:So does the club collaborate with other student organizations or departments at MSU on the sustainability initiatives?
Luca:So we regularly send someone to represent our club at the Student Sustainability Leadership Council, which is kind of a body that has representatives from basically every major sustainability group on campus, whether that's a RSO or something that's led like, for example, SLE has their eco reps, which are designed to promote sustainability in all the residence halls, for example. And then we regularly get together to talk about events going on on campus and things that we can do and collaborate. For example, the the educate the environmental education fair that was put on yesterday was done in conjunction with ASMSU and all of the clubs that are part of the Student Sustainability Leadership Council.
Tessa Kresch:What kind of events do you guys hold?
Chloe:We host many events. We've put on, especially this spring, probably something every weekend just because I'm very ambitious. We've done a hayride, an upcycling event where we learned how to upcycle and we had the resources so we could all upcycle together. And we've done our semi annual trash pickups, competitions, a tailgate, thrifting outing, a trip to a refillery. A refillery is where we can basically take empty bottles and refill them with soap so it's not wasting from, like, a store when you have to get, for example, Dove soap.
Chloe:You have to get another bottle. This place, you can just take that bottle and fill it with soap rather than wasting the packaging. We've also done things like plarn making and even having a invasive species specialist type of person from campus, Carolyn Miller, and she came to educate us on local invasive species and how to remove them.
Luca:I think one of our more popular events is that every semester, we do a trash pickup competition where we basically split up into teams and go around campus, and whichever team gets the most amount of trash within an hour gets, free dairy store ice cream.
Tessa Kresch:That sounds so fun. I would love encouragement like that to pick up trash. Yeah.
Luca:It's certainly effective.
Tessa Kresch:Is that for anybody who wants to come or
Luca:is that
Tessa Kresch:or just the sustainability
Luca:side? For anyone.
Tessa Kresch:That's awesome.
Chloe:On April 20th, we will be doing a mindfulness walk, and this is where we are going to walk along Red Cedar River and basically look for colors and pick them up. So if we see perhaps a green piece of trash, we'll pick it up Just kind of being mindful of the environment and seeing all the different things that you probably wouldn't see unless you were trying to.
Tessa Kresch:What are some creative ways that students can be more sustainable in their everyday lives here on campus?
Luca:I think I'm gonna say that it's getting over the mental hurdle that you think that you're gonna have to do, make implement a big change that's gonna cause a lot of disruption to your life. Because a lot of times it's really not all that bad. I mean, when you see how things are portrayed in the media, sometimes you think that's what it has to be. But a lot of times it's something really simple. For example, getting into meal prepping and planning out when you're gonna cook your meals instead of, like, oh, I have so much homework tonight.
Luca:I'm not I don't have time to cook. I'm just gonna, you know, order takeout or do fast food or something like that. Or for example, well, we're all or the electronics generation, so to speak, or the ones that are really sucked into it. And now there's most devices will allow you to go directly into their power utilization programs, and you can directly tweak those to make them more efficient. Or there's just a little setting that says, hey, power saving mode.
Luca:Just switch that on.
Luca:I know that those are probably more common examples, but a lot of the changes that we can make to be more sustainable are really simple and just elude you in the moment. And sometimes you just need to kind of just unplug and just think a little.
Luca:And those little changes add up and go a long way.
Tessa Kresch:Right. Exactly. The little things.
Chloe:For me, I definitely think reusing, we often get the idea that we have to buy a bunch of things to be sustainable, and that's actually the complete opposite of what you're supposed to do. So, for example, you might see at Target things like reusable straws. You can actually just reuse the ones you get from, like, McDonald's if you really want to or, like, the Tupperware. You don't need to buy Tupperware. A lot of takeout places, I think Noodles and Company, they have Tupperware you can just keep using, put it in the dishwasher.
Chloe:So a lot of the things that we use a lot, we can actually just keep using instead of buying.
Ben:Like I said before, finding ways to get around besides driving, like biking or walking is not only sustainable, but also fun and healthy. And if you have to if you get lost once or twice, I think that's a benefit because you learn where you're going, and it's it's more fun.
Tessa Kresch:Until you're late to class.
Ben:Right. So test it out. Know where you're going first.
Tessa Kresch:Right. That's that's a good thing to know. Alright. And how can listeners who are passionate about sustainability get involved in the broader movement even if they're not affiliated with MSU? Is there any ways that people can get involved to support what you guys are doing?
Chloe:I would probably say watch some media about it, such as YouTube or even Instagram has good accounts that can inspire you and then making change locally. That's pretty much what our club is about, really. It's just trying to make things happen that better the environment that we can do. So even if you're not at MSU, if you think your local area needs more bus stops and better transportation, you can advocate for that and get a petition going. Things like that are really helpful.
Luca:I think community volunteer work is great engine wherever you are to get more involved in this, and that doesn't that goes so far beyond just sustainability as well. Honestly, a lot of these a lot of the changes that could be made to be more sustainable are, honestly,
Luca:go hand in hand with just greater mindfulness and just greater self improvement. I think part of why people are hesitant to get on the sustainability bandwagon is a lot of times, like, the media is, like, kind of guilting you into it, and I think that that kinda creates a really depressing atmosphere about it. And I think that's something that we should, if when possible, try and move away from.
Luca:And I think that's something that we try and do with our projects as well.
Ben:And if you want to make changes, it's also important to reach out and to know who to reach out to is sometimes difficult. But Michigan State has some committees that you can often sit in on or be a part of, such as landscape or, like, 5 year planning meetings that that the public is often allowed to sit on and weigh in. So looking out for those opportunities is super important. There's also email newsletters that you can sign up for. For instance, the Office of Sustainability has an email newsletter they send out each month each month with which will have some of those opportunities within those newsletters to let you know about them.
Tessa Kresch:Awesome. Alright. I wanna get back into the organization. So you guys meet weekly. Right?
Luca:Yes. Could you tell
Tessa Kresch:me about what a meeting usually looks like?
Ben:Yeah. So we meet for an hour on Tuesdays from 7 to 8 PM this semester, and we are in Wells Hall a 126. And we usually start our meeting off with some announcements. So we'll announce events that are going on. So whether the whether those are our own events or events that other clubs are putting on or events we're collaborating with or just happenings that are going around on campus to enable people to see more things related to sustainability and and just give them opportunities that they might otherwise not know about.
Ben:And after that, we will usually have a sustainability in the news section where one eboard member or member of the club will have read a recent article, so, like, several years old or or more recent, and present on the article, summarize it, and and come up with some questions about it to have a discussion about the topic that that article is related to. And that usually leads to a substantial discussion that those are a part of our club that our members really enjoy. And then after that, we will move into working on our projects that we usually have going on, although sometimes we will have games with prizes like Jeopardy or something like that. Or we may have a guest speaker, in which case we would forego the sustainability in the news. Like, for instance, when Carolyn Miller came in to talk about invasive species, that was how our meeting went.
Tessa Kresch:And how would you describe the camaraderie within the group? Do you guys have bonding activities? Are you a tight knit group?
Chloe:I believe so. I I think the general meetings are already very tight knit, just helping each other. It's very collaborative. Getting to know one another is a big thing in our group. But the outside of events the outside events are even more that way because we are essentially just having fun and hanging out and doing sustainable things together.
Luca:You asked about bonding events. I would like to say that usually several times this semester, we all, like especially around the holidays, we'll, like, just choose a movie to watch during a meeting
Luca:or something, and then pull together and get some food, and just just be like, hey, we're taking a break today.
Chloe:And just Mhmm.
Luca:Let our stresses go to the wind for a bit and just enjoy that.
Tessa Kresch:Absolutely. Sometimes that's necessary, especially right now.
Luca:Yes. No kidding.
Ben:So after our meetings, people also usually linger around and talk. So that's a really good chance to get to know our members and have them get to know each other, and that makes them hopefully become friends and more likely to continue to be a part of Sustainable Spartans and, be interested and passionate about sustainability. So I think that's something that's really important that might be overlooked, staying and just talking to people whether it's about sustainability or other topics.
Tessa Kresch:Totally. And if someone is interested in getting involved in Sustainable Spartans, how can they get involved in the club?
Ben:So we meet, as we said, in Wells a 126 on Tuesdays and from 7 to 8 PM, and we'll have our final meeting of the semester next Tuesday. And you can also follow us on our Instagram, which is at sustainable dot spartans. And from there, there's we also have a GroupMe, which there's a link to on our Instagram.
Luca:I would say we post most of our events and just the dealings of our club on our Instagram. So if anyone's interested, I would say give that a follow. And if anything catches their eye on there, we're always welcome. Always welcoming of new people.
Chloe:We also have plans for next year to make an even better club and to get even more done on campus. So as we all know, this year is coming to an end. We are gonna come back even stronger and have so much ready for everyone next fall.
Ben:Yes. So you can look for us at this participation next fall and sign up for our email list and, hopefully, check out one of our meetings.
Tessa Kresch:Do you have anything else, Ted?
Ben:I will say we will have a mascot next year. Oh. So, hopefully, they'll be at some of our meetings.
Chloe:I have a dog as I mentioned earlier with the poop bags. Her name's Ella Stein, and she's running for mascot for upcoming years.
Tessa Kresch:That's so exciting. Well, that's a lot to look forward to. Yeah.
Chloe:It's awesome. Been at some meetings before, and, hopefully, she'll be coming again.
Tessa Kresch:And that's it for our show. Thank you to our station manager, Delaney Rogers, general manager, Jeremy Whiting, and program director, McKenna Lowndes. And as always, thank you to you, our listeners. If you like what you've heard, come back next week. I'm Tessa Creche.
Tessa Kresch:You've been listening to Exposure. This was this week's episode of Exposure. Keep in mind that the views and opinions discussed on exposure are those of the guests and do not necessarily reflect those of the staff at impact 89 FM. If you're course, if you're interested in what's going on next week, you can tune back in and we'll see you back here. You've been listening to Exposed.