Earth Week comes once a year, it equips students and faculty with the knowledge they need throughout the year to make the world a better place.
Since the 70’s Murray State has been esteemed for its interest in the environment. Since then, different groups and organizations in the community have worked together to spread the word about caring for the environment.
Murray State will recognize Earth Week April 22 through 26 with workshops, lectures and activities for the students, faculty and staff.
Earth Week, according to Allison Crawford, junior from Murray and member of Murray Environmental Student Society, is a week long event scheduled around Earth Day.
“Earth Week is geared toward helping students become more sustainable and promote MESS,” she said. “It’s also a great extra credit opportunity for those involved in environmental or agricultural classes.”
On Monday, April 22, MESS will be kicking off the week with the Leave No Trace workshop at 3:30 p.m. on the Carr Health lawn.
The workshop will teach those who attend how to go camping without leaving traces of themselves behind. Knowing how to leave no trace will help keep animals from scavenging places where humans have been in order to survive. Instead, the animals learn to live on their own in the wild.
Continuing with the celebration of Earth Week, at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday another workshop will be available on Hart Lawn. The Vermicomposting workshop will teach students and faculty how to reduce their carbon footprint during college by creating a compost bin with earthworms in their dorms, apartments or homes.
“Compost piles reduce waste,” Crawford said. “And if you do it the right way, they won’t smell. Some people use it as fertilizer or sell (the compost.)”
At 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday in Freed Curd Auditorium, Claire Fuller, Howard Whiteman and Josh Jacobs will be presenting a lecture “Sustainability at MSU.” Lauren McGrath from the Sierra Club will be appearing as a special guest and presenting “Moving Beyond Coal: Building a Clean Energy Future.”
The last events will take place on Thursday, April 25 at 3:30 p.m. on Carr Health Lawn. Dick Shore, a John Muir impressionist, will interpret John Muir’s work “A Thousand Mile Walk to the Gulf.” This will be an interactive workshop. Later at 7:30 p.m. a documentary film “Your Environmental Road Trip” will be shown in Freed Curd Auditorium.
In addition to Earth Week, MESS organizes other community events such as trash pick up on county roads and highways and activist weekends. MESS has an overall goal to raise awareness on and off campus about the environment, but they also enjoy being outdoors.
MESS meets every Thursday at 5:30 p.m. in Carr Health Building Room 103.
Story by Hunter Harrell, Staff writer.