Final!

Sustainability is way for us to live in such a way that allows for future generations to live comfortably as well. Some things that are most problematic when it comes to living sustainably and maintaining the standard of living we have grown accustomed to having are the affluence we have in the U.S. and the lack of environmental education. I have learned so much from this class and have become much more aware of my surroundings and I think it is important for everyone to understand the environmental problems we, as a country, are facing. If more people we taught about how things such as poverty affect our way of life, sustainable changes could happen faster. Affluence is a major problem because our country has an obsession with convenience(plastic water bottles) and does not always realize the environmental cost of being wasteful (government subsidized water costs).



The zebra mussel is one example of something I've enjoyed learning about in APES. Before I took this class, I never knew anything about invasive species. This year I learned that the environment can be affected by things other than just humans. Even though sometimes invasive species are brought into certain areas by humans, the effect is still somewhat natural. And the fact that natural occurances of invasive species can be just as harmful to the environment was pretty interesting to me. It opened my eyes and showed me that even if we are not the cause, there are still ways for us to prevent some of this destruction.



Another thing I found interesting this year was the discussion we had on genetically modified foods. It takes a lot of effort and smarts to figure out how to take out certain allergens from bananas and make certain foods change colors. Although this stuff could be helpful in some ways, it is still costly and detrimental to the environment. Changing foods from the way they were meant is something that starts under the careful watch of scientists and genetic engineers, but quickly becomes something out of their control because sometimes the organic and genetically modified foods are indistinguishable.



Even though it seems cliche, I really have learned a lot about reuse and recycling this year. When the guy from Lipton came to talk about how they became zero landfill, that seemed like a goal we could work towards as a school. Although it might not be logical to become zero landfill, there are a lot of things we could do to reduce our ecological footprints. This class really opened my eyes to some minor changes that could be made to make a much bigger difference in our environment.