As the semester winds down and the weather starts to warm up, there is more time to spend outdoors with family and friends. No more waking up early for class or staying up to all hours of the night writing papers. But that doesn’t mean to stop your already developed green living habits!

Natural shade allows for a cool escape without wasting power and energy. (AP Photo)

With leaves, flowers and plants blooming and becoming more vibrant, there isn’t any better opportunity to help the environment.

Here are some easy summertime green tips so you can get the most out of the months to come.

1. Give your dryer a break, hang laundry out to dry: Dryers use up a lot of energy. Point blank. The U.S. Department of Energy estimated that a normal household dryer uses more energy than any other appliance in the house. The hot temperatures and constant breeze are not only better for the environment, but also your clothing. Air-drying doesn’t wear out fibers or cause color fading.

2. Air conditioner vs. ice: That’s right, ice can cool down your house too. Situating a bowl of ice in front of a fan can cool down a room almost instantly and using a fraction of the energy needed to power an air conditioner, not to mention the added moisture in the air helps with temperature.

3. Walk or ride a bike: Nothing is worse than being trapped in a car with a bunch of people on a hot summer day, especially if you’re condemned to a lengthy car ride. Try riding your bike or walking in order to make the most out of the gorgeous weather, plus it takes the strain off your wallet.

4. Grow your own shade: I can’t recall how many times I’d lie in my backyard and yearn for shade until I decided to grow my own. I started planting trees in my backyard at a very young age and now almost 15 years later I have created a nice sanctuary that keeps me out of the harmful rays of the sun.

Before you leave the College for summer break, you might be wondering what to do with all of your unwanted furniture and clothing when moving off campus. Everyone should go and check out Bonner’s Reduce for Good Use campaign.

Paula Figueroa-Vega, associate director of the Bonner program, has taken on the initiative to alleviate the problem of college students wasteful end-of-semester behavior. She’s created a pick-up service that collects unwanted furniture pieces, including furniture, rugs, refrigerators, electronics, appliances, non-perishable foods, linens, clothes, shoes and coats. All proceeds benefit the Rescue Mission in Trenton and its many patrons. The Rescue Mission is a “local not-for-profit that services the homeless population,” according to the Bonner website.

“The Rescue Mission of Trenton currently derives approximately 30 percent of its annual operating revenue from the salvage and resale of clothing, furniture and household items donated by the public,” the website states. “The bulk of the items sold at the Mission Store, located at 98 Carroll Street across from The Times, comes from donations from the public.”

This opportunity is open to both on and off campus College students and everyone is encouraged to participate. Instead of throwing out that old microwave, why not make a difference in someone’s home?

Any further questions should be directed to Paula Figueroa-Vega at pfiguero@tcnj.edu.

Between work, friends, food and everything else piling up on a student’s plate, saving the environment typically gets tossed in the trash.

Last Monday, April 22, Sodexo’s marketing team at the College brought awareness to wastefulness by showing students how much food is wasted in one lunch hour at the Atrium at Eickhoff. During the “Earth Day Plate Scrap,” several staff members stood at a table by the dish receptacle, sweeping leftovers into transparent buckets which would be measured by weight later that day.

Staff piles waste to highlight students’ poor eating habits. (Photo courtesy of Jack Meyers / Nation & World Editor)

“This year we had 50 pounds of waste,” said Caitlin Moskwa, unit marketing coordinator for Sodexo. “Our goal is to make them more conscious of what they take in this all-you-can-eat setting.”

This was done in celebration of Earth Week, coordinated by WaterWatch. Throughout the week, campus-wide events took place to illuminate how students impact their surroundings on a daily basis.

In 2007, students wasted a whopping total of 221 pounds over the span of two hours, according to Joanna Brunell, area marketing coordinator for the Sodexo at the College. With awareness campaigns across the campus and student’s weaning off of tray use in response, the solutions have already begun to set in.

Moskwa and her team are not the only ones arguing the value of awareness.

In fact, one College student spends much of her time teaching others how to cut down on water and energy consumption and, ultimately, how to preserve nature.

“By educating everyone where they make the most of their environmental mistakes, we can train people to be more mindful (elsewhere),” explained Tarika Mahal, leader of the sustainability ambassadors and site leader of the Bonner Center’s environment team.

Mahal began the sustainability ambassadors this semester as “a grassroots movement that starts in the resident halls,” where she explained, “people still don’t know how to recycle” nor understand “the importance of taking shorter showers.”

The diverse conglomeration of groups and initiatives on campus that have contributed to progress over the years include WaterWatch, which aims to “better the environment” via student-focused activities, and PC3, President R. Barbara Gitenstein’s commitment to conserving energy and water.

With a myriad of sources on how to cut down, one of Mahal’s goals is to “bridge the gap” between groups like WaterWatch and the Bonner Center, fusing the outside community with the student body.

“By doing so, we would be able to tackle different issues, like re-vamping the library’s recycling system or make it a custom to use reusable bags in the C-store,” Mahal said.

With new relations proposed, the College faces new opportunities to save itself and the environment.

In the northeast corner of campus lies a group of three buildings, far from the bustle of the Brower Student Center and liveliness of Alumni Grove. The students who pass through this cluster are few and far between. Benches are stripped from the walls, paving stones are crumbled, and massive brick edifices betray the near-empty interiors of the “Forgotten Quarter.” These buildings — Holman Hall, Roscoe West Hall and Forcina Hall — stand as a testament to an earlier time at the College. Now, falling into disuse and disrepair, they represent an opportunity to revitalize an often neglected part of campus.

Holman Hall

Holman Hall is perhaps the most notorious building in the “Forgotten Quarter.” It was reported by The Signal in November 2011 to have been built upon an Indian burial ground, lending to rumors that the building is haunted. In its previous life, it housed the art department as well as English classrooms. Along with computer sciences, the building houses several of the college’s organizations, such as the Bonner Center. In September 2012, NJ.com reported that a dozen employees had complained of dizziness and fainting spells after moving into the building.

The College, as of early September, reported that no unhealthy conditions were found.

The building itself is disconcerting; its architectural style is incongruous with the buildings surrounding it on Quimby’s Prairie. Standing at the end of its bare, stripped hallways, one can see that the building is so long and unwieldy that it has its own horizon line, bordered by exposed concrete, old lockers and endless rows of fluorescent light. Stepping into Holman Hall is a trip back in time — faded chalk art is scribbled on the outside walls, and more anachronistic artwork hangs in the lobby.

Holman Hall is reportedly slated for demolition next spring, with the passing of the Building Our Future bond measure. President R. Barbara Gitenstein explained during a press conference on Wednesday Oct. 24 that a technology, engineering and health sciences building would be built in its place.

Roscoe L. West Hall

Across from Holman Hall is Roscoe West Hall, the College’s former library. In two now unconnected sections, the newer part, built in 1968, holds career services and was recently renovated, having been abandoned following the construction of the New Library. The older part, built in 1934, and formerly the library, is sealed off and the hollow exemplar of the “Forgotten Quarter.” Unlike Forcina or Holman Halls, it is much closer to other buildings on campus. It stands in plain sight, with paint chipping off of the stately building, soaring columns and handsome brick façade.

The upstairs rooms of the new section sit largely empty, though are used occasionally for lectures or meetings. The second floor also contains a room labeled “Sarnoff Collection,” which is planned to be a communication museum dedicated to former RCA chairman and NBC founder David Sarnoff. The rest of the rooms are locked and alarmed. The basement of the new section remains in a state of utter disarray, closed to the public but to the eye, filled with empty furniture, stripped carpets and fallen ceiling tiles.

Holman Hall. (Brian Kempf / Features Assistant)

Forcina Hall

Forcina Hall is the final building of the College’s “Forgotten Corner.” Formerly the Education Building, it recently received a refurbishment to its exterior. Like Holman Hall, it remains the site of a few school organizations, but is largely vacant. The first and second floors are open, though a trip to the second floor is particularly eerie. Crafts still hang on bulletin boards and outdated fliers for student activities and internship opportunities still hang on the walls. There are plans to renovate the third and fourth floors of Forcina, however, and convert them to offices once Holman Hall closes and the offices located there are displaced.

While no college maintains a perfect aesthete, the College’s Forgotten Quarter remains a visible reminder of the College’s ever-changing plans. Its highly-visible location and purpose as a host for the outside community (which is served by organizations such as TCNJ Clinic, the Kidsbridge Museum and the Bonner Center) reflect poorly on the College when these areas are in such disrepair. The College continues to build new buildings, but it should not forget that current assets are disused, within a stone’s throw of Green Hall and the heart of the campus.

Correction: This article originally stated that Holman Hall was abandoned at one point in time.

It is a multi-billion dollar global industry, saves trillions of tons of resources annually, has an iconic logo and its virtues are sung aloud at elementary schools across the country every Earth Day. At the College, however, students, faculty and administrators still face the dilemma of how to prevent environmental waste.

For instance, a main issue often faced is that custodians throw away the contents of recycling bins along with the trash. Often custodians are simply doing their jobs to prevent contaminants, or non-recyclable items, from costing the College in fines and waste, according to an EPA report and administrators at the College.

The College looks to new programs to correct recycling habits. (Photo courtesy of tcnj.edu)

“We get reports from concerned people that we have custodians throwing recycling away with the garbage, but usually when we trace it back they were just doing their job of throwing out contaminated recycling,” said Brian Webb, director of risk management, occupational safety and environmental services at the College.

The fact is, if contaminants reach recycling centers, they can cause a slew of problems for the College, waste haulers and recycling centers.

“I’m really for recycling, but it isn’t always something at the front of my mind on a busy day,” sophomore chemistry major Taylor Horsefield said. “You aren’t thinking that a one second mistake of recycling a Naked bottle can cause such a big problem.”

This is one example of how, despite the national impact of the 1987 Recycling Act, recycling efforts often suffer from a severe lack of awareness.

To combat this, College administration has been refining tactics to help make recycling an instinctual habit for busy members of the College community. Educationally, the administration has been placing recycle information cards in freshman dorms to inform them what can and can’t be recycled.

“We currently have single-stream recycling, but that is kind of a misnomer, because when people hear that word they think anything with a recycle sign can be recycled,” Webb said. “People have to be aware about placing what where. We don’t want Naked bottles or coffee cups going in the recycling and turning the whole thing into trash.”

Logistically, the recycling cans themselves have also been a point of emphasis for on-campus improvement. The College is in the midst of a 10-year program for purchasing recycling receptacles.

The end goal of the program is to have a recycling can next to every garbage can, according to Edward Grubor, director of Buildings and Grounds at the College.

“We started to put a lot of thought into the labels we use on the cans,” Gruber said. “It’s a delicate balance because if there is too much on the signs and containers, people can’t process all of that.”

Recycling right would save money. (Photo courtesy of tcnj.edu)

In addition to the environmental stake, the College also faces an extra financial burden if recycling habits are not corrected.

“If a lot of contamination starts showing up at the recycling center, they can fine the hauler who can pass that fine along to us,” Webb said.

Aside from monetary consequences, contaminants in the recycling stream can cause a county to lose 7,000 tons of recyclables in a year, according to the EPA’s 2006 King County MRF Assessment.

“The thought is we want to focus on freshmen to get them while they’re young. Otherwise, if we put paper cards in every room, we’d be defeating the point of recycling,” Webb said.

Despite the steps taken by the College to spread awareness, an exercise held by the Bonner Center last year challenged students to sort real trash and recycling into their respective categories, but even the students administering the exercise had difficulty with the task, according to Amanda Radosti, professional service specialist and environmental program specialist at the College.

“There is so much information on what can be recycled and what can’t, the challenge becomes how to simplify it and distribute that message,” Webb said.

Raising awareness for recycling would not even be an issue if the waste management infrastructure was capable of sorting garbage and recycling on its own, but that currently isn’t a viable solution, according to Grubber.

While the College may not be able to support the programs at this time, the College is open to the idea of a student group adopting a recycling program as long as they coordinated with the administration, according to Webb.

“If we had a larger structure to support recycling then we could have crews dedicated to sorting recycling from trash,” Grubber said. “The end goal though would be to put all waste through a facility and have it sorted there. That would be the ultimate technology, but it isn’t currently commercially available.”

Going beyond common consumer waste, the College has made a habit of incorporating recycling into its regular business practices.

“When I first got here, we bought new mattresses and I saw all the old ones going down the street and I just thought, what a waste,” Grubber said. “If we have to purchase 1,000 mattresses, it’s easy to put it in the contract that the successful bidder has to provide some type of recycling … it’s just the responsible thing to do.”

These recycling practices have extended to scrap metal, computers, grass clippings and even debris from Hurricane Sandy cleanup, according to Webb.

“We’ve all incorporated practices like this into our everyday business,” Webb said. “We are responsible for everything from cradle to grave.”

Looking to the future, the College is working with Sodexo contractually to make sure there is a program in place to get into food recycling. While the actual sorting of the food would be up to Sodexo, the College would be able to haul the waste, according to Grubber.

Another huge recycling initiative for the College is the third annual Reduce for Good Use. The program collects clothing, furniture, electronics, kitchenware and non-perishable food on a request basis and donates it to The Rescue Mission of Trenton. The event will be happening from Wednesday, May 8 to Friday, May 10. To donate an item call 609-771-2548 any time between 12-8 p.m. and your donation will be picked up.

Reduce for Good Use has the potential to save the College money, save resources and help out others in need.

In 2009 almost 30 million tons of plastic were created in the United Sates, but only two million tons were recovered, according to KeepAmericaBeautiful.org. With such alarming statistics, it is comforting to know a group of students on this campus are doing the best they can to get others involved to “go green.” Earth Week is scheduled for April 22-26 this year and is being headed by TCNJ’s Water Watch.

This year, Water Watch is hosting the third annual Earth Week, in which they will have daily activities to inform the campus community about the various ways students impact the world around them. Water Watch will be selling flowers that they have planted in biodegradable pots starting Monday, April 22 in the Brower Student Center. Later in the week, they will be planting flowers around campus in the hope that students will buy a flower and join in planting. Some of the other events include a water taste test, which will promote the use of tap or filtered water over bottled beverages, an organic chocolate covered strawberry giveaway, which will promote organic as well as local produce, a reusable bag giveaway and a campus-wide cleanup. Water Watch will be co-sponsoring with The Bonner Environmental Team, Phi Kappa Psi, Beta Beta Beta, Alpha Kappa Delta, Sigma Kappa, Sigma Sigma Sigma and the College Democrats.

Jessica Serpico hopes to use Earth Week “to raise awareness about environmental issues and educate the campus on everything we, as college students, can do to help alleviate both TCNJ’s and the greater Trenton area’s environmental issues.” Serpico hopes to instill the Water Watch “coined term ‘green consciousness’ within the entire student body.”

Since Earth Week 2011, Water Watch has planted flower seeds in hand-folded cubes made from old Signal newspapers, because they are “biodegradable, therefore, once the flower (and flower owner) is ready to plant the flower, the entire unit, newspaper, soil and plant, can go directly into the ground,” Serpico said. Water Watch plants these flowers in mid-March, allowing time for the seeds to grow into the flowers they use during Earth Week. All of these plants are maintained in the Biology Department’s greenhouse. These flowers will be sold in the student center between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Monday through Thursday of Earth Week.

On Friday, April 26 between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. there is going to be a campus-wide cleanup. As an organization, Water Watch dedicates a few hours every other Sunday to cleaning up areas around the campus. To be able to better measure the progress that the organization is making with the cleanups, they weigh the trash they collect. Up to this point in the semester, Water Watch has collected 64.7 pounds of trash and 24.7 pounds of recycling.

Kristen Batko, treasurer of Water Watch, declares stream walking as her favorite activity the organization offers. Stream walking allows members of Water Watch to travel to local streams, collect aquatic macro-invertebrates, and identify what family the organisms belong to. It is after they collect these samples that they are able to determine the quality of the local stream they just explored, “a non-invasive way to (determine) organic pollution levels of a stream,” Batko added. Through biological and visual assessments, the club is able to gauge the health of the water and then passes the information they collect on to the Department of Environmental Protection.

When Serpico joined as a freshman, Water Watch was very small and consisted of a four-person E-Board and three additional active members. Today, Water Watch has approximately 20 active members. Water Watch meets every Monday night in SSB 225 at 9 p.m. For more information on Water Watch and Earth Week, find them on Facebook at: facebook.com/TCNJWaterWatch.

A shocking one in four women is the victim of an attempted or completed sexual assault during her college career, according to Brady Root, prevention education coordinator at Rutgers’ Office for Violence Prevention and Victim Assistance.

Students watch SCREAM. (Courtney Wirths)

That means that of the estimated 3,600 female students at the College, about 900 have been, or will be, a victim.

“Chances are everyone in this room … will know someone who was either the victim or the perpetrator of sexual assault,” Root said.

On Tuesday, April 9, the Rutgers student theater group, SCREAM, or Students Challenging Realities and Educating Against Myths, presented an improvised but realistic skit on sexual assault, victim-blaming and bystander intervention. The event was brought to campus by Anti-Violence Initiatives, Women in Learning & Leadership, the Bonner Center and the School of Humanities and Social Sciences.

“People tend to brush (sexual assault) off as something that happens in movies or TV shows,” said Tiffany Piatt, sophomore biology major and co-vice executive chair of WILL. “But this is way too common.”

The skit, performed by undergraduate Rutgers students, revolved around friends who planned to attend a party together. While they were pre-gaming, freshman Jessica Clark’s character, Liz, followed Cory, played by senior Chris Sharma, into his room. When Liz pulled away from Cory’s kiss, he respected her decision, agreeing to take her on a date first.

However, when senior Benny Del Castillo’s character, Jess, stayed behind with Ryan, played by senior Gabriel Arismendi, Jess thought that they would be flirting and end up kissing at most. Next thing she knew, Ryan was forcing himself on her, muffling her screams and shouting at her to “take it like the slut (she is).”

“What do you think you came up here for?” he said.

“Ryan, please don’t do this to me!” she screamed. “I just want to go back downstairs.”

The rest of the skit followed the reactions of the friends involved. Liz, Jess’ best friend, claimed that Jess was exaggerating and blamed her for “being a slut.” Jayden, played by sophomore Joie DeRitis, insisted on going to the police, despite Jess’ plea to be left alone.

Freshman Moya O’Leary’s character, Sam, preferred to stay out of the conflict, while Cory decided to confront his best friend about the rape. Ryan denied the accusations, and the two exploded into an argument.

The performance ended with a question and answer session with the actors while still in character, followed by the actors’ individual takes on lessons to be learned.

“Just the performance itself showed that we need to have more resources and better support networks for our victims … so they can resolve their internal issues,” said Amanda Parks, sociology junior and executive chair of WILL.

When explaining the event’s purpose, Root said, “We want to talk about how can we break those (barriers) down, and build stronger communities where we’re there for each other. We all have a role in ending sexual violence, in our communities, in our colleges, in our state, everywhere.”

Often in the local environment, the value that businesses and nonprofit organizations contribute to the community is beyond measure. In fact, without community organizers or the revenue and jobs that businesses provide, growth would be impossible.

Debbie Taylor, campus interior designer, sits with local business owners. (Jack Meyers)

When the community spends money locally, businesses can afford to hire more people, and the population gets the direct benefits. In addition, when nonprofit organizations use volunteers to provide services at low or no cost to the public, the state government can charge less through taxes, giving people more to spend.

Fortunately for the Trenton-Ewing area, the College’s able minds constantly pump out new initiatives and strategic plans to better the local community and the economy. In order to do so, College partners have mainly taken a two-pronged approach: building the capacity of nonprofit organizations and investing in businesses.

“You can’t work in an insular environment,” said Heather Camp, Director of the Bonner Center at the College’s CEL II Program. “You can’t achieve the same amount if you don’t work in a collaborative fashion.”

With over a decade of experience in the nonprofit sector, Camp has most recently headed the AmeriCorps Volunteers in Service of America (VISTA) project alongside the national Bonner Foundation in Princeton. This program is funded by the AmeriCorps national service and is a multi-campus effort targeted directly at combating poverty. The program is centered at the College’s Bonner Center and runs on a three-year cycle which is in its second year of operation.

“I think this provides opportunities for nonprofit organizations to get together and talk about what their organizations need,” Camp said, highlighting the importance of building capacity “to better serve the populations that they serve.”

This specific VISTA grant sponsored 12 leaders who are assigned to a variety of tasks — from outreach and volunteer management to advising groups on practical applications of research.

Camp and one of two VISTA leaders, Stephanie Kraver, have focused on incorporating local businesses into the College’s spending.

“I think it’s ideal that TCNJ gets involved in the local economy,” said Kraver, the asset-based community development coordinator for the VISTA project.  On Thursday, March 21, Kraver held an event with the Mid Jersey Chamber of Commerce to educate businesses on doing business with the College.

At the event, Mark Mehler, director of budgets at the College, gave a presentation on the College’s purchasing procedures. Business owners were given the chance to meet with College staff such as the interior designer and electrician to discuss future purchases.

“We’re a big economic presence in Ewing,” Mehler said, highlighting that the College can, in theory, provide local businesses with sustainable profits.

“As a small business owner, I see TCNJ as a stable source of recurring income,” said Marilyn Silverman of Word Center Printing in Hamilton.

Alongside this businesses initiative, the VISTA project is also taking a social development approach to growth.

Part of Camp’s yearly work plan includes strategizing with the non-profit sector on how to practically execute their missions.

“I think people sometimes do things out of a gut instinct without proper information,” said Kamran Hakiman, community networking coordinator for the VISTA grant, explaining that in order for a community to raise itself out of an adverse state, it needs to make knowledgeable decisions.

To combat inefficient tactics, Hakiman is part of a team developing the site policyoptions.org to be launched in May. According to Hakiman, the site will use “schools as information hubs” to “create systemic change” by connecting community planners to relevant data.

“Instead of just saying ‘Oh, a lot of people need jobs,’ we can focus on key industries,” Hakiman explained, referencing his report on industry clusters.

Nicol Nicola, the MJCC’s economic policy specialist, helps Hakiman and the VISTA organizers to promote community development.

“It’s very important because we are engaging the local economy,” Nicola said, “which helps keep the money and jobs in our community.”

By joining with the near-by suppliers, Nicola argued, the community is at a distinct advantage for short-term and long-term growth. According to one of Nicola’s recent research projects, a 2003 report conducted by Civic Economics, “concluded for every $100 spent at a chain, $13 remained in the community while $45 remained when spent with hometown businesses.”

“You work with small businesses because they live in the community, so they have a stake here to work with local government and to help the local economy,” Nicola said on hyper-local approaches.

In the end, what gives development and growth their value is the prospect of giving people the chance to help themselves.

“In my opinion, it’s a basic necessity for human potential to be realized,” Hakiman said, satisfied with his work.

Humans are creatures of habit. This seems especially true when it comes to destructive habits, such as not recycling, using too much electricity and other habits that cause extra strain on the environment.  In order to facilitate student-to-student education about these habits, how destructive they are and how to stop them, a new program has been formed at the College called Sustainability Ambassadors.

“We hope (Sustainability Ambassadors) will be successful at educating students because it will feature students talking to students as opposed to just posters on a wall,” said Tarika Mahal, sophomore pre-med major and leader and originator of this President’s Climate Commitment Committee (PC3) initiative.

For six years, PC3, a committee made up of College administrators, faculty and Bonner Center volunteers, has been striving to reduce the College’s carbon footprint. The Sustainability Ambassadors program represents the first PC3 initiative where student will be charged with educating their peers in order to modify their eco-behavior.

“SA was created to better spread PC3 initiatives, but it differs by being more of a grassroots movement, as opposed to an administration mandate,” Mahal said.

A SA meeting last Thursday drew a turnout of 22 student ambassadors. The ambassadors split into groups of three and each group chose a residence hall to concentrate their efforts on.

Mahal has outlined 13 different initiatives she would like ambassadors to focus on, but her top priorities are to make recycling sexy, or advertise it in a way so that most people will like it, to get people to turn off lights in unoccupied rooms and to get people to take shorter showers.

Previously, PC3 has used dorm competitions as a way to motivate students to use less resources, but Mahal is hoping that the SA initiative will improve upon those competitions.

Mahal hopes that ambassadors will be able to communicate with community advisors to help advance the goal of carbon neutrality through creative means, such as using skits during hall meetings and educational talks from ambassadors.

Mahal said that her inspiration for creating the SA group came from a program at Tufts University that her best friend is involved in.

The eco-ambassador program was established at Tufts University in 2007 and is one of the programs that their office of sustainability offers.  The Tuft’s office is staffed with two full time and one part time faulty members and has since made the top 10 greenest schools list for the Sierra club.

An ambassador for Decker Hall, sophomore self-designed environmental economics major, Patrick Dyer said,  “I think it’s important to emulate other schools’ succseful programs. I am really excited to start working with my friends and fellow Decker residents to help minimize our economic impact.  I feel like a personalized message from students will be more effective than hearing the same rhetoric from government agencies.”

The SA program is open to new ambassadors. If interested email Mahal at mahalt1@tcnj.edu.

Violence does not only impact victims that have been directly harmed, but also affects those who have witnessed it. The College’s Bonner Center hosted a forum on Thursday, March 21 that questioned a panel of experts dealing with violence on community and political levels.

Michelle Daniels, the Network Community Coordinator for Trenton, works at the Bonner Center and organized the forum in hopes of providing awareness and reducing violence.

The panel included regional medical examiner Dr. Roger Mitchell Jr., Dr. Sandy Gibson of the TCNJ Department of Counselor Education, Assistant Attorney General Wanda Moore, director of Urban Alternatives Solutions Larry Davis and Eugene Thomas, founder of Buried Treasures.

The experts focused on the need for treatment among victims of violence in impoverished areas. They also discussed some possible solutions to decrease violence in communities.

Thomas, who grew up in a rough environment in Newark, N.J. and spent several years in jail, spoke passionately on behalf of the cause.

“We can afford to incarcerate children, but we can’t afford psychological help,” he said. He was raised believing physical discipline was “normal” and as a consequence of this exposure to violence, suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.

“Suburban American children get immediate counseling,” Thomas said after being exposed to violence, while poor children do not. “All children must be treated the same.”

Davis explained that many children were misdiagnosed with having ADHD and are not given the chance to use services that will truly help them.

Mitchell went on to explain, “We need to start framing violence as a public health issue.”  If violence was given a “multi-disciplinary approach,” it would help decrease its occurrence.

“A known and expected outcome to being exposed to violence, is violence,” Mitchell said. Each panelist agreed that violence primarily begins at the home and with the family life of a child.

Moor, who was a public defender before becoming assistant attorney general, explained that in many of the assault cases she has faced, “no one talked about what would happen to the child.”

While violence is a reality that is extremely difficult to overcome, the panelists offered solutions that they hope can reduce violence in communities and provide proper care to those that fall victim to it.

Gibson offered different policy approaches to the community. She explained in detail how she developed an Across the Ages Inter-generational Program, “targeting youth and specific risk factors for youth and family in a specific community.”

The program was successful because they gathered information on one specific area. This program may be unsuccessful in other areas because it does not fit the needs of other communities. “You need strategic planning,” Gibson said.

There are models that can be adapted to multiple communities, explained Gibson. Creating employment opportunities and businesses in violent and impoverished communities instills a sense of hope. “They feel they are valued,” she said.

Relating to Gibson’s comment, Mitchell later said, “A job is a bullet proof vest.” He elaborated that a sustainable community decreases violence.

“Education has been a surrogate family,” Mitchell said. A caring teacher can make a difference in a child’s life, one who may not be cared for at home.

“A single caring adult is the strongest resiliency factor in combatting violet behavior,” Gibson said.

Moore stressed to the audience, “Ask questions if a child doesn’t come to school” and to never say “what’s wrong with you?”, but rather, “How can I help you?”

Similar to Moor’s caring approach, the panelists all agreed it takes sincerity and trust to help victims exposed to violence. Davis, who has worked with and helped many troubled children, explained that the solution lies with behavior modification and “post-criminal thinking.” But most of all, to be sincere, “show them some peace and love,” Davis said.

By Sorraya Brashear-Evans

Columnist

Before I went off to college, I heard horror stories about the massive weight gain from unhealthy eating, exhaustion from too much work and an overall decline in health and hygiene. After being here for almost a year, I can honestly say IT’S ALL TRUE. I’m sure you’ve all heard of the “Freshman 15,” but in my case it was more like “Freshman 37.” In a little over a semester, my diet has gone from mostly salads to mostly bean burritos. My consumer habits have also become very lax within the past semester-and-a-half that I’ve been away; at home, it’s easy to monitor how much I’m buying and how much I’m throwing away. So I’ve compiled my top five ways to be eco-friendly while away at college.

1. Ride your bike/walk instead of driving

This is an awesome way to burn a few calories while reducing your carbon footprint. You will no longer be a slave to your gas gauge, traffic accidents or construction work. Riding your bike or walking around campus gives you a dose of fresh air while allowing you to explore. Not to mention that, by opting to not drive a car, you’re helping to improve the air we breathe. Almost every car on the road today runs on fossil fuels that emit harmful chemicals into the atmosphere, polluting our air. And to all the broke college students out there, riding your bike can be your salvation.

Living an earth-friendly life shouldn’t ‘brake’ once you’re off to college. (AP Photo)

2. Wash clothes in cold water

I know this doesn’t sound appealing to most, but honestly it’s not that bad. Did you know that just heating the water to wash ONE load of clothes uses almost 90 percent of the machine’s power supply? Washing clothes in cold water not only saves money, but also helps to  preserve your clothes from fading and shrinking. Tide has just come out with cold washing detergent, so go try it out!

3. Recycle, Reuse, Reduce

We’ve all heard this saying before, whether it was in school, from our parents or on television. Recycling is more than dragging those blue bins to your curb every week; it’s about separating what can be used again from true waste. Doing this ensures more use out of lesser products. Reusing something cuts down the amount of generated waste, which, in turn, relieves some stress on the environment. Finally, reducing the amount of goods you consume saves you money while lessening waste amounts. Try to squeeze everything out of what you have; you’ll be surprised by how much you save.

4. Hit up thrift shops

No longer is the thrift shop exclusively for Macklemore and Ryan Lewis. Thrift shops are great places to buy unique pieces of clothing — or anything else you can find — for GREAT prices. Hipster moment: I’ve been thrifting way before that song came out and can honestly say I’ve found better clothing there than at any retail store. Scared to wear someone else’s clothes? Well the washing machine was invented in 1908 and seems to do the trick! Not only is thrifting good for your wallet, but for the environment too, harnessing already made or used clothing reduces the amount of waste that’s weighing down the Earth.

5. Get involved

Talk with eco-reps on campus about how to get involved with the movement for a more environmentally friendly campus. At the College, we have many environmental outreach groups such as Water Watch and Bonner’s Environmental Team, which both do a phenomenal job of garnering awareness about how we treat the planet while also having fun doing it. Getting involved exposes you to many great opportunities at hands-on conservation while allowing you to make new friends in the process. I encourage everyone to reach out to their local eco-friendly organizations, whether they’re in your town or right on campus.

While some residents in Ewing may have their grievances with rowdy party-goers at the College, local businesses see the student population as an asset when it comes to the economic boost and acts of volunteerism the College brings to the area.

Mamma Flora's Restaurant in Ewing. (Natalie Kouba / News Editor)

APO members bag pasta for the Mercer Street Friends Food Bank. (Photo courtesy of Danielle Mignella)

“From a business perspective, I never heard anybody complain about TCNJ,” said Nicol Nicola, economic policy specialist for the Mid Jersey Chamber of Commerce.

The College employes over 900 people, she said, in professors, maintenance workers, etc. The direct economic impact the College has on Ewing involves the people it employs and the approximately 6,000 students it brings in, living in the area and paying tuition. The indirect impact is that these people that the College brings in become consumers in the area.

Due to the housing situation this year, approximately 100 students resided in two Ewing hotels. As a town that is not a tourist attraction, Nicola said, the hotels benefited from the College in this aspect.

Students and College employees eat in Ewing restaurants, fill their tanks in Ewing, shop in local pharmacies, and commuters even stop in the Dunkin’ Donuts in Ewing for their morning caffeine fix.

Mamma Flora’s Trattoria owner, Gary, said his restaurant sees “probably a 20 to 25 percent boost when the College is in session.” Mamma Flora’s is just one of the restaurants in Ewing which sees the College as a positive asset to the town. Gary said he is sure it benefits the whole economy of the area.

Not only is the College beneficial to the local area, according to the owner, but he said he has had positive encounters with College students 99.9 percent of the time. Like any restaurant, he has had to deal with a “few unruly kids,” but he is proud to be able to give back to the College through fundraisers and other events.

The town, according to Nicola, is trying to bring even more revenue to Ewing. Through current projects, such as Campus Town and the reconstruction of the GM site, the town hopes to deter students from going outside Ewing for shopping and spending. They hope to establish a better reputation for Ewing, as well as associate the College’s name and reputation with Ewing, like in Princeton.

College students can been seen as assets to the local economy, in addition to their non-profit work. Student organizations such as the Bonner Center and the co-ed service fraternity, Alpha Phi Omega, volunteer in Ewing often.

Each member of APO is required to perform at least 20 hours of community service per semester. While the sites for their community service are not exclusive to Ewing, groups from the fraternity volunteer once a week at the Mercer Street Friends Food Bank and the Ewing Animal Shelter Extension League. In February, APO accepted an award for the large amount of food donations from the College in 2012.

However, it is not just the required hours that keep volunteers going back to lend a hand.

“Students who volunteer at one of our many weekly projects in Ewing keep going back every single week because they truly enjoy giving back to the town of Ewing and knowing that they are making a difference,” said Danielle Mignella, vice president of service. “It is important to show the community that we care about them.”

The Bonner Center has also been collaborating with Ewing on town projects.

“At present, we are working with Ewing’s Green Team to help them complete actions and become certified with Sustainable Jersey,” said Heather Camp, senior program director for CEL II & special initiatives.

In addition to volunteering with the Green Team, the Bonner Center organizes Community Engaged Learning Day in and outside of Ewing.

“Hopefully our relationship will continue and expand as there are many more ways we hope to work together in the future,” Camp said.

Student Government announced that planning for the third annual Funival, a campus carnival, is well underway at their weekly meeting on Wednesday, Feb. 6. The event is set to take place on May 3, the Friday after classes end, and is co-sponsored by SG, the Student Finance Board and the College Union Board.

Last Tuesday, Feb. 5, students and town members alike, attended the Town Gown meeting, where concerns pertaining to campus/Ewing relations were expressed.

“When they saw students there, I think it really did make the impact on how they reacted to what we presented,” said SG president Christina Kopka.

Kopka mentioned concerns that Ewing Township and its residents expressed, such as smashed mailboxes, excessive noise and stolen street signs. For each street sign that goes missing, the town must pay $300 to replace it, and $150 for every stop sign. Kopka reported that the town is up to almost $20,000 in damages from sign replacements alone and will most likely be attaching GPS tracking chips to each sign in town so they will be able to locate signs if stolen.

“Overall, it was a really positive meeting,” Kopka said. “I think we moved forward and are starting to patch relationships between the residents and ourselves.”

The next Town Gown meeting will be held in April.

There was a deadline last semester for student organizations to register with Student Activities. Devin Dimmig, vice president of governmental affairs, announced some clubs, such as Bonner Volunteers, the Engineering Honors Society and Russian Club, that will be derecognized by SG. These clubs can become recognized again by SG by going through the same process that new clubs do.

Class council informed SG members of fundraising efforts for their classes. The junior class reported the success of their blood drive, where over 50 people donated blood.

In this coming week, class of 2014 tank tops will be coming in, which say “So College” on the front and “of New Jersey” on the back. The juniors will also be co-sponsoring the career fair on Feb. 22.

The sophomore class announced they have selected all 12 contestants for the Mr. 2015 contest and advertising for the event will be coming soon.

By John Irvine

Correspondent

The Demonstration Garden is just one effort to make the College greener.(climate.pages.tcnj.edu)

The day after tomorrow may hold a truth that is inconvenient, but the College isn’t standing by idly.  In order to fight the climate-changing greenhouse gasses that are emitted from the College, President R. Barbara Gitenstein, in 2007, signed the American College & University President’s Climate Commitment, a pact that binds 665 institutions to strive for environmental responsibility.

The President’s Climate Commitment Committee, or PC3, was formed shortly after the signing and was tasked with helping the College to meet the various requirements.  To fulfill this mission PC3 has attempted to introduce numerous initiatives to raise awareness about environmental perils and to change student and faculty behavior.

Past initiatives include requiring all new appliances purchased by the College to be Energy Star appliances, buying carbon off-sets and sponsoring programs to raise awareness and education.

“TCNJ has reduced its carbon footprint, as measured by the Green House Gas (GHG) inventory, from 39,927 metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) in 2008 to 14,743 metric tons of (CO2) in 2011,” said Matthew Golden, associate vice president for Communications, Marketing and Brand Management.

Progress has been made, but the president’s Climate Commitment Committee (PC3) is still rather new. Despite its novelty, The Princeton Review cited the College as one of the 322 most environmentally responsible “green” colleges in the nation in 2012.

Another way the College works to reduce carbon emissions and to further this headway is to endorse the College’s iCarpool initiative. The concept is simple: fewer cars on the road equals less CO² in the air.  iCarpool encourages students, faculty and staff with similar commutes to ride together.  For those who participate, there are special parking spaces around campus reserved for carpoolers. In addition to the incentives of reducing carbon emissions and getting a priority parking spot, there are also gift cards awarded to those who participate in the iCarpool program.

The Demonstration Garden between lakes Ceva and Silva is also set to be moved to a more visible location. The Bonner Center plans “to relocate it along Metzger Drive, east of the College’s Green Lane entrance,” Golden said. The new location will also feature an outdoor classroom and a quiet reflection area.  According to the PC3 website, produce will be donated to the Trenton Area Soup Kitchen.

In order to boost awareness through competition, PC3 plans to introduce a new tradition to the College by putting the students of Travers and Wolfe in an energy usage competion. The dorm that uses the least energy from November through March will win the challenge.

PC3 also plans to promote awareness of carbon emssions through a three-part film series including the movies “Dirt!,” “PlanEat” and “Crude Impact.” The movies have the common theme of promoting ecological awareness and they will take place on Feb. 25, March 25 and Oct. 22.

“We have a lot of ideas that have the potential to really cut-down on emissions,”  said Patrick Dyer, a sophomore biology major and student representative of PC3. “We just need more student involvement to make the initiatives work.”

PC3 members garden on campus. (climate.pages.tcnj.edu)

A Salvation Army volunteer embraces the College’s volunteers from the Here for Home campaign. (Photo Courtesy of hereforhome.pages.tcnj.edu)

Here for Home, a campaign that is dedicated to helping aid in Hurricane Sandy relief efforts, officially began at the College on Nov. 1, 2012. On that day, approximately 45 people, the majority of whom were students, attended Here for Home’s first meeting and were eager to help.

During its initial weeks, the campaign responded to requests for assistance from towns including Belmar, Point Pleasant Beach, Hazlet, Manasquan, Toms River, Neptune and Brick. Volunteers participated in multiple service activities which included gutting homes, removing debris, door-to-door canvassing and installing sheetrock, according to Pat Donohue, assistant provost for Community Engaged Learning Programs.

However, the program is now focusing its efforts on Union Beach and Ortley Township.

“The unemployment rate in Union Beach was 20 percent before the storm,” Donohue said. “And Ortley Beach is home to 1,600 full-time residents, who were among the last to have access to their properties on the Barrier Island due to the level of destruction.”

On Saturday, Jan. 26, a group of volunteers from the College spent the day at Union Beach gutting five apartments in a senior citizen’s complex that have been uninhabitable since the storm.

“I really loved breaking down and ripping out walls,” said Tarika Mahal, sophomore history pre-med major and Bonner Scholar. “It felt great to see our progress and help those who physically could not do this work for their homes.”

Although difficult, volunteers believe that spending their days rebuilding areas of New Jersey that have been affected by the hurricane is incredibly important.

“I am a busy college student who could have definitely used the extra hours of sleep on a Saturday morning, but instead I woke up at 7:30 and smashed drywall. And ripped up carpets. And broke tiles,” Mahal said. “All these things were so much more memorable and beneficial to myself and others than my few extra hours of sleep.”

Since its initiation, the Here for Home campaign has greatly expanded. According to Stephanie Kraver, ‘12,  an AmeriCorps VISTA Fellow for the Bonner Center, 296 volunteers have signed up to be on the campaign’s regular mailing list. And to date, more than 300 people have participated in nearly 20 service days or events, totaling approximately 1,400 hours of service.

However, these figures do not include the work of other clubs and groups that have started their own volunteer projects. In fact, to date, Here for Home has 1,668 members in its Facebook group, according to Kraver.

“I firmly believe that volunteering is our civic responsibility. TCNJ prepares us for our future professional life, but does so much more than that,” said sophomore psychology major and Bonner Scholar Regina Zick.

Here for Home was also very successful last semester. Students and faculty donated over 4,000 pounds of supplies, donations through the dining service’s card swipe campaign raised $3,195 worth of supplies, and the student-designed ReNew Jersey T-shirt sale raised $1,387 in cash. All of these funds help cover the costs for service supplies, such as gloves and garbage bags, as well as transportation.

In addition, the Student Finance Board has allocated $15,000 that will send 15 busloads of volunteers to work on relief projects throughout the spring semester, according to Donohue. Here for Home is also planning to create an Alternative Spring Break trip for students to engage in relief efforts.

Also, last semester student groups and organizations held various fundraising events such as a Zumbathon held by TW fitness instructor Carmella Holl, a caroling fundraiser held by LDP, and various other events held by numerous sororities and fraternities.

“I am extremely impressed with the campus’s capacity to unite under one cause. We have worked with countless groups on campus, expanding to different individuals, and even to some freshman floors that have consistently helped out,” Zick said.

For students and faculty who wish to volunteer, there will be sign-ups in the Brower Student Center the week of Jan. 28 in order to reserve a seat on one of the 15 buses going to the shore during the spring semester.

“We as people have a common obligation to help our fellow citizens in times of need,” Mahal said. “There is no better cause than this.”