Volume LXIII, Issue 19
sbstatesman.com
Monday, February 17, 2020
2020 Spring Sports Preview SBU participates in RecycleMania
By Niki Nassiri Staff Writer
Stony Brook University kicked off its participation in RecycleMania 2020, an international university recycling competition, in East Side Dining on Feb. 12. The festivities began with a 15-minute performance by the Spirit of Stony Brook Marching Band. Thirteen offices and clubs, as well as the Town of Brookhaven, CulinArt and Tidal Tees Apparel, tabled at the event. The kickoff educated students on green living and promoted participation in RecycleMania. RecycleMania is an annual competition between universities and colleges in North America. Over the span of two months, schools will self-report weekly the amount of recycling and trash collected to an online system called ReTRAC. RecycleMania then ranks participants according to category. The competition strives to motivate students to recycle and reduce waste, promote on-campus recycling programs and encourage school administrations to track waste production so recycling measures can be improved. “I’d like to see what I can do as a participant,” Michael Strenc, a junior environmental studies major attending the event, said. “I’m very pro-environment.” The 8-week challenge is split into four subcategories tracking different types of recycla-
MATTHEW YAN / THE STATESMAN
The Tao Drummers in rehearsal hours before their performance on Saturday, Feb. 15, on the Staller Center Main Stage. The modern performance showcased the high-energy art of Japanese drumming. bles, ranging and, in some categories, waste. Stony Brook’s participation in RecycleMania 2020 marks a return to the competition for the first time since 2017. Faculty Student Association (FSA) Executive Director, Van Sullivan, made it a goal to participate during his first semester at the university in Spring 2019. “I was associated when I worked at UMass Amherst for many years,” Sullivan said. “When I came down here, I said why aren’t we doing RecycleMania?” The Department of Recycling & Resource Management, CulinArt and FSA will work together every Monday from Feb. 2 to March 28 to report the previous week’s trash, food waste and recycling statistics to RecycleMania.
Tanya Sengupta, a project coordinator at the Office of Sustainability and a junior technological systems management major, warned students to put their recyclables in the correct bins and not the trash. “Please put [recyclables] nicely in the recycling bins,” she said. “Don’t just put it in the trash. Be careful about that.” Since Nov. 28, 2018, the town of Stony Brook and SBU only accepts plastics No. 1 and No. 2 and are rejecting soiled cardboard and glass through curbside pickup to avoid contamination. Glass may still be recycled at drop-off locations throughout Brookhaven. Zachary Sicardi, recycling coordination aid at the Town of Brookhaven who was also at the event, educated attendees on how to recycle correctly.
Sicardi emphasized that recycling is not “a be all end all solution,” and that people should try to use reusable containers rather than disposable plastics. “If we don’t take for granted the whole process that everything goes through to get to our hands, then we’ll be well on our way to zero waste,“ he said. The Office of Sustainability offered reusable water bottles and bottle stickers to event attendees. The bottle stickers are used as part of their Fill It Forward Campaign, a project focused on eliminating single-use plastic bottles. Students scan the sticker each time they refill their water bottle, earning points that can be redeemed for prizes, like Wolfie Wallet gift cards and Stony Brook merchandise.
Stony Brook ranked 169 out of 190 overall in RecycleMania 2017, and tied for third place with Saint Louis University out of 42 schools in an electronics waste special category the same year. Several hundred schools will participate in RecycleMania, including seven SUNY's. “We want to be number one in SUNY, and number one in the nation one day,” Sullivan said. But he emphasized that the most important goal remained to teach positive behaviors. “We can sort of get you in the habit of taking that extra 10 minutes to get your [reusable] water bottle and get your reusable container and maybe ask a restaurant why they don’t use the right stuff either,” he said. “That’s a gift you can take with you for the rest of your life.”
Diana Voss, director of academic technology services and planner of the event, said. The submissions will start on Feb. 24 and conclude on April 3. Judges will then narrow down the results to a final list between April 8 and 16. Voting will be available on SB Engaged between April 22 and 24, where the SBU community will be able to select their favorite submission from the final list. The creators of the final list would attend an awards ceremony on May 6 during Campus Life Time, Voss said. Students and staff would gather to recognize the submissions and formally announce the winner. The location for the awards ceremony is yet to be announced.
Although the prizes for the winners are undecided, Voss said that a Bluetooth printer, Wolfie Wallet dollars or digital badges — which can be displayed on LinkedIn profiles — are on a short list of potential rewards. David Ecker, the director of iCREATE, said SBU Inspirations is meant to be a fun activity that helps to both educate faculty on how technology could help their classes and help students showcase their projects to peers and potential employers. He encourages the use of the iCREATE’s innovative technology, such as One Button Studio in the Educational Communications Center and the Green Screen in Harriman Hall, to craft the SBU Inspirations submissions. iCREATE
and other resources available to the student body are compiled on an SBU Inspirations website. “We were trying to figure out how we get [the technology] out there and make a buzz about it so that people know what's going on,“ he said. “[Stony Brook has] a number of services that students don't know about.” Community members are also encouraged to nominate students to showcase their work through Inspirations, and staff members to participate in the judging process. “There's all this learning happening not only in the classroom but also outside [the classroom] that Stony Brook is giving to our students, that we want to make sure that [students are] recognized,” Ecker said.
“This is a way of highlighting and helping others.” Victoria Wander, junior psychology major and development coordinator for SBU Inspirations, said that the event will allow her peers to share cool ideas, gain potential collaborators and “spread creativity around campus.” She has also been advertising in the Student Activities Center to help generate interest in SBU Inspirations, in addition to making a video that will be up before submissions, about the competition. “We want to get as much participation as we can so that people really start spreading their ideas and sharing their creativity,” Wander said. “We want to be a collaborative event so people can grow from their own and everyone else's ideas.”
Pilot competition encourages students to showcase through technology By Alek Lewis
Assistant News Editor
A pilot competition at Stony Brook University (SBU), called SBU Inspirations, will bring together students and staff in an effort to showcase student projects and experiential learning through the use of innovative technology. SBU Inspirations invites students to create a brief multimedia presentation that showcases a project, talent, idea or academic experience through the use of different technological resources available to the Stony Brook community. “The concept [for SBU Inspirations] was the ideas that students have that will inspire others to adopt technology,”