ABC University and The Power of Education

In this section of my blog, I am going to discuss some sustainability practices at an educational facility in Panama, what they are currently doing and in what areas they can improve. For the purpose of this blog and to not disclose the name of the university or its employee’s identities, all names will be changed.

ABC University is a small university that has associations with prestigious universities in the United States. This university does not have very many eco-friendly practices or process in place. Their major contribution to the environment is in the form or recycling, primarily paper, which is a good place to begin, but I feel that there are other areas in which they can improve.

For instance, living in the technology age, the entire university should be paperless, with the exception of making copies for students etc. This can be accomplished by beginning at the beginning; the enrollment process should be paperless, no forms, no receipts, everything electronic. Also the university should implement a policy of utilizing books strictly online; these two items combined, in addition to the recycling practices currently in place, is a great way for the university to begin green business practices.

Although the employees interviewed are not necessarily willing to take a decrease in salary, they agreed that they would be willing to pay higher prices for products or services as long as the organization has sustainability practices in place. I think this is good, however they are not willing to sacrifice themselves or their own salary; so the question then becomes how important is the environment to them, really?

However I can understand their point of view as Panama as a whole is not very environmentally friendly; there are no city/country wide recycling programs and as far as the general population’s level of education regarding environmentally friendly practices, the government has an enormous amount of work to do in that arena; the public needs to be educated as to what they can to do to help the environment, what they can to do on an individual level and as a community, but more importantly, they need the resources and a support system provided by the government.

Returning to the issue of the university, I feel that they have the resources and the power to make a difference in the community, and even though they have some eco-friendly programs in place, there is much more that they can do to begin an environmental revolution, as they have the power of education behind them, to help preserve what is left of our precious Earth…