Back to Nature Awareness..

An account of the Dedicant's efforts to work with nature, honor the Earth, and understand the impacts and effects of the Dedicant's lifestyle choices on the environment and/or the local ecosystem and how she or he could make a difference to the environment on a local level. (500 words min.)

This requirement is a lot more difficult...how do you separate out what you do with Nature everyday from this requirement?

I work with Nature each and every day, from documenting biodiversity in my area for projects like Noah and the NWF. I honor the Earth by participating in renewal events like Arbor Day, Earth Day, the 350.org project to lower climate impact/change, and Earth Hour (where countries all across the planet turn off electricity for one hour to show solidarity for positive change.) I am incredibly conscious about my personal impact on my environment locally and on a larger scale. 

In the past, I have taken effort to research how big my carbon footprint is and to come up with/implement ideas on how to lessen it. When I was living in my apartment alone, I got my electricity bill from $20 at the start down to under $2 a month just by switching off electronics when they weren't being used and by going to CFL bulbs in 90% of my fixtures. I recycled at home and at work, and re-used and re-purposed items at home and at work. 

When I was younger, my Urban Ecology class teamed up with the Rhode Island DEM and demolished an old drive-in movie theater, turning it into a restored natural wetlands. I spent a year and then some helping divert a portion of the Blackstone River through the wetlands (creating a man-made estuary) and then monitored soil and water sample levels after that.

Additionally, I spent a summer teaching water conservation education to a group of underprivileged adolescents as part of an extended-education program called SPIRIT as well as having the opportunity to take part in research during that summer on the Aletta Morris, a vessel designed for shallow and deep-water research owned by the Rhode Island chapter of Save the Bay.

For making a difference on a local level, I plan to maintain working with local foundations for Earth and Arbor Days as well as community clean-up projects when they pick up in the Spring. My partner and I remain conscious about our energy consumption at home and may consider options to lessen our carbon footprint in the future.