To be announced.
Due: Counts as one blog entry for week 8.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Exercise 2 (Week 2): Calculating Your Ecological Footprint
Calculate your ecological footprint (not carbon footprint as previously stated) for the month based on what you do in a week. Use the footprint calculator described in Radical Simplicity, pages 94-122, along with the forms and tables supplied in the appendix. Read the pages about the calculator carefully as you go through and make calculations, because they tell you exactly what to do. Compose a 1-2 page writeup that:
1. Summarizes the results of your footprint calculations and compares them to the average American footprint (see page 93 in RS).
2. Briefly discusses those results; sets short, medium, and long term goals for lowering your score; and indicates how you plan to lower your footprint to meet your short term goal by the end of this quarter.
3. Includes your calculations and all tables/forms from RS that you used (these don't count towards your page total).
Due: Tuesday of week 4.
1. Summarizes the results of your footprint calculations and compares them to the average American footprint (see page 93 in RS).
2. Briefly discusses those results; sets short, medium, and long term goals for lowering your score; and indicates how you plan to lower your footprint to meet your short term goal by the end of this quarter.
3. Includes your calculations and all tables/forms from RS that you used (these don't count towards your page total).
Due: Tuesday of week 4.
Exercise 3 (Week 3): Response to Radical Simplicity
For one of your blog entries this week, write a one page response to Radical Simplicity. Make sure to address the following questions in your review:*
1. Now that you have read RS, imagine yourself and your lifestyle 10 years from now. What does it look like? How did you envision yourself 10 years from now, before you read the book? Has your vision changed? Your answers should include a brief characterization of your current lifestyle and a discussion of your material and immaterial goals as they relate to sustainable lifestyles.
2. Does the lifestyle that Merkel lives seem radical to you? Do you think he goes too far? Why or why not? Don't just answer yes or no. Be specific and thoughtful, utilizing the concepts from RS to reflect on your own willingness or unwillingness to live as simply as the author advocates.
Due: Counts as one entry for week 3.
* You can blog this in whatever manner you devise as long as your answers- regardless of what form they take- remain clear to the reader. In other words, feel free to get creative.
1. Now that you have read RS, imagine yourself and your lifestyle 10 years from now. What does it look like? How did you envision yourself 10 years from now, before you read the book? Has your vision changed? Your answers should include a brief characterization of your current lifestyle and a discussion of your material and immaterial goals as they relate to sustainable lifestyles.
2. Does the lifestyle that Merkel lives seem radical to you? Do you think he goes too far? Why or why not? Don't just answer yes or no. Be specific and thoughtful, utilizing the concepts from RS to reflect on your own willingness or unwillingness to live as simply as the author advocates.
Due: Counts as one entry for week 3.
* You can blog this in whatever manner you devise as long as your answers- regardless of what form they take- remain clear to the reader. In other words, feel free to get creative.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Exercise 1 (Week 1): Personal Trash Inventory Instructions
For this exercise, you will keep track of everything you throw away over the course of a typical school week. There are three stages to this exercise so please read CAREFULLY.
1. Take inventory
While following your usual habits and routines-that is don't try to change what you do, at least not yet- take inventory of everything you throw away or recycle (if you normally recycle). Carry a small notebook wherever you go and jot down a description of every item you throw away or recycle for each day.
2. Organize a tally
Once you have a raw inventory, sort it into larger categories like "plastic bottles" and "paper items" and decide how you want to present a total tally. Then, enter this information into a spread sheet and email it to me.
Your record should be organized by date and the types of items you throw away. It should also include grand totals for the entire week. Details and embarrassing or confidential information need not be conveyed to me nor to the class; however, during the initial recording stage, do keep detailed descriptions to aid you in your organization of the data. For example, we don't want to hear about "36 squares of toilet paper at 8 AM" though you should write that in your notebook. Instead try to come up with larger categories of materials that include particular items and ways of quantifying them. You might estimate quantities in number or area. So, instead of "1 dirty tissue" or "1 empty Coke bottle" you might create the categories "Sq. footage of paper items" and "#'s of small/med/or large plastic containers" then do the math. You won't know exactly how your spread sheet should look until you have completed part 1 above.
3. Blog it
In a blog entry titled "Personal Trash Inventory", reflect on and answer the following questions as best you can:
1. Do you think you throw out a lot of trash? Did you consider yourself wasteful before this exercise? What about after?
2. If you can identify an area of particular wastefulness, what is it and how can you reduce your waste in that area?
3. What aspects of your current lifestyle are reflected in your trash inventory? What did your inventory reveal about your own personal, familial, and cultural values, beliefs, and practices as they relate to sustainability and the environment? [For example, why is it that in the US we tend to take for granted and not questions the availability and consumption of disposable items that we use on a daily basis- cups, bottles, packaging- when we could use the same cup or bottle and no packaging at all in most situations. In fact, reusing vessels or containers over and over again has been the rule not the exception throughout history, across different societies. Why is it that we toss valuable and limited resources with little or no second thought then?]
4. What did your inventory reveal that you did not already know? How does this lifestyle that you see reflected in your trash inventory compare and contrast with one advocated in the first few chapters of Radical Simplicity?
Due: Tuesday of second week.
1. Take inventory
While following your usual habits and routines-that is don't try to change what you do, at least not yet- take inventory of everything you throw away or recycle (if you normally recycle). Carry a small notebook wherever you go and jot down a description of every item you throw away or recycle for each day.
2. Organize a tally
Once you have a raw inventory, sort it into larger categories like "plastic bottles" and "paper items" and decide how you want to present a total tally. Then, enter this information into a spread sheet and email it to me.
Your record should be organized by date and the types of items you throw away. It should also include grand totals for the entire week. Details and embarrassing or confidential information need not be conveyed to me nor to the class; however, during the initial recording stage, do keep detailed descriptions to aid you in your organization of the data. For example, we don't want to hear about "36 squares of toilet paper at 8 AM" though you should write that in your notebook. Instead try to come up with larger categories of materials that include particular items and ways of quantifying them. You might estimate quantities in number or area. So, instead of "1 dirty tissue" or "1 empty Coke bottle" you might create the categories "Sq. footage of paper items" and "#'s of small/med/or large plastic containers" then do the math. You won't know exactly how your spread sheet should look until you have completed part 1 above.
3. Blog it
In a blog entry titled "Personal Trash Inventory", reflect on and answer the following questions as best you can:
1. Do you think you throw out a lot of trash? Did you consider yourself wasteful before this exercise? What about after?
2. If you can identify an area of particular wastefulness, what is it and how can you reduce your waste in that area?
3. What aspects of your current lifestyle are reflected in your trash inventory? What did your inventory reveal about your own personal, familial, and cultural values, beliefs, and practices as they relate to sustainability and the environment? [For example, why is it that in the US we tend to take for granted and not questions the availability and consumption of disposable items that we use on a daily basis- cups, bottles, packaging- when we could use the same cup or bottle and no packaging at all in most situations. In fact, reusing vessels or containers over and over again has been the rule not the exception throughout history, across different societies. Why is it that we toss valuable and limited resources with little or no second thought then?]
4. What did your inventory reveal that you did not already know? How does this lifestyle that you see reflected in your trash inventory compare and contrast with one advocated in the first few chapters of Radical Simplicity?
Due: Tuesday of second week.
Grading Policy
Participation = 33%
- This includes attendance and participation in class and on fieldtrips. It also includes reading and commenting on your classmates' blog entries and completion of any readings and exercises assigned in class.
Blog = 33%
- Assessment of your blog is based on the quality of writing, originality and accuracy of content, its informativeness and whether you complete all blogging assignments. If I: 1. enjoy reading your blog, 2. learn something from it, and 3. can see that you are learning something too, well, then you're doing an awesome job!
Project = 33%
- This includes whatever you decide to do outside of class for your project as well as your final presentation of that project.
A mid-quarter report will be available sixth week, so you can track your progress.
- This includes attendance and participation in class and on fieldtrips. It also includes reading and commenting on your classmates' blog entries and completion of any readings and exercises assigned in class.
Blog = 33%
- Assessment of your blog is based on the quality of writing, originality and accuracy of content, its informativeness and whether you complete all blogging assignments. If I: 1. enjoy reading your blog, 2. learn something from it, and 3. can see that you are learning something too, well, then you're doing an awesome job!
Project = 33%
- This includes whatever you decide to do outside of class for your project as well as your final presentation of that project.
A mid-quarter report will be available sixth week, so you can track your progress.
Resources and Links
UCLA and other organizations
- Sustainability website: www. sustain.ucla.edu; lots of resources and links.
- Ecology. Economy. Equity. Student group dedicated to environmental and justice issues.
- http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/002924.html (link takes you to article that talks about Europe's footprint, but check out the rest of the site too).
- Organic Gardening Class Article about a 6 week gardening class at UCLA that happens on Saturdays with Rosa Romero.
Farms and Food Stuff
- http://urbanhomestead.org/ Check this family out! And here's a short video about them.
- Polyface Farms; These folks are talked about in Omnivore's Dilemma.
- McGrath Family Farm; Field trip destination.
- Slow Food LA; "Supporting good, clean, and fair food production and consumption in Los Angeles."
- Cool Foods Campaign; "The Cool Foods Campaign educates the public about how food choices can affect global warming and empowers them with the resources to reduce this impact. Join our 'Cool Foods' Campaign and help take a bite out of global warming by changing the way you eat."
- Eat Low Carbon; Estimate the footprint of particular meal items by dragging and dropping them onto your plate.
- How to go green in the kitchen This page offers lots of useful tips.
- http://www.eatwild.com/products/california.html Pastured meats directory for California.
Restaurants
- Govinda's 6$, all-you-can-eat vegetarian buffet at the Hare Krishna temple in Palms. The food is very delicious!
- Lucques Gourmet, seasonal, local, organic, sustainable cuisine by Chef Suzanne Goin, who trained at Chez Panisse. Treat yourself and a special someone to a very memorable meal!
- Ford's Filling Station This is another locally renowned restaurant specializing in artisinal, organic, seasonal cuisine. Don't let the prices intimidate you. Wait for a special occasion and treat yourself!
- Chez Panisse Often touted as the place where the organic food movement and California Cuisine were born, Alice Waters' seasonal, local cuisine proved to be a major historical force driving and inspiring the growth of farmers' markets, first in the bay area, then all throughout California and across the country. Located in Berkeley, CA. For more info watch "Food Fight", a documentary about the organic food movement in the US.
Recommended readings and videos: Because social justice, economic, geographical, cultural and other issues are so integrally tied to our relationship with the planet, I've included a variety of books on this list that aren't strictly about the environment or sustainability.
- Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (credited with starting the modern environmental movement)
- Walden by Thoreau (classic account of simple living)
- A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold
- Radical Simplicity by Jim Merkel
- Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown This is about the genocide of native Americans by US govt. and pioneers. An important and interesting but not very happy read.
- The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein This about how free market reforms have been made and what their consequences have been around the world.
- Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond This was made into a pretty good documentary that helps explain some of the economic and technological disparities between developed, technologically advance societies and other not so advanced societies
- Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey This is about Abbey's time in Southern Utah in and around Canyonlands and Arches National Parks. He's an excellent writer. These two parks and the surrounding desert are home to some the most magical and otherworldly landscapes on the planet.
- The Monkey Wrench Gang also by Edward Abbey This is a fictional account of radical activism.
Nature and outdoors:
- National Parks (link to interactive map of all the parks and from there to each park's website)
- Sierra Club "...America's oldest, largest, and most influential grassroots environmental organization."
- Online John Muir exhibit "America's most famous and influential naturalist and conservationist". If you haven't heard of Muir you must check this out!
- Restore Hetch Hetchy! "...a wonderfully exact counterpart" of Yosemite Valley -John Muir; but unfortunately it was dammed in 1923. This site is dedicated to the ongoing fight to restore Hetch Hetchy Valley.
Technology and designs for sustainable living:
- Earthship Biotecture Mike Reynold's company that designs and constructs Earthships.
- Green Home Building Really cool site that summarizes lots of techniques and provides many links for further reading.
- Composting Toilets On the Cheap This guy shows you how to build your own or if you don't feel inclined to do so, how to buy his. Has interesting instructional videos.
- Composting Toilets on the Steep Envirolet's official looking website to sell their toilets. Their systems really are well designed, just too expensive for most.
- Solar ovens Solar ovens use reflective surfaces at different angles to concentrate light from the sun onto a pot of food (beans, soup, roasts, etc.). They are easy and practically free to make.
Energy use:
- Energy Information Administration This is part of the Department of Energy. This link takes you to a summary of statistics on electricity usage for the average American household for 2001 and several other years. There is a VAST amount of information and stats on energy consumption in the U.S. available through this site.
Lifestyle: These sites cover social justice, environmental, and lifestyle choice issues related to sustainable living. They are holistic in that sense. They overlap a bit but content varies surprisingly so check them all out.
- Santa Monica Green Office Buying Guide It says "office" but most of this stuff could work for a home as well.
- Earth Easy Information, suggestions, and products for more sustainable living. Very comprehensive source and quite well organized, but not always scientifically rigorous.
- Mother Earth News News and how-to articles, links and other resources all related to greener living.
- Resources for Life Yet another interesting site about better (more sustainable) living. Lots of links to all sorts of other sites.
- Sustainable living guides A database of several dozen different guides published at different university and college campuses around the country.
- Self Sufficient Living Site about homesteading, gardening, making things you normally buy.
Pets:
- Reduce your dog's footprint Unfortunately this article missed out on an opportunity to address what's really at issue- what your dog eats. Dog food contributes the most to Fido's footprint b/c of what it's made of- chicken and corn. This article focuses on important but less consequential aspects of your mutt's human run lifestyle.
-
- Sustainability website: www. sustain.ucla.edu; lots of resources and links.
- Ecology. Economy. Equity. Student group dedicated to environmental and justice issues.
- http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/002924.html (link takes you to article that talks about Europe's footprint, but check out the rest of the site too).
- Organic Gardening Class Article about a 6 week gardening class at UCLA that happens on Saturdays with Rosa Romero.
Farms and Food Stuff
- http://urbanhomestead.org/ Check this family out! And here's a short video about them.
- Polyface Farms; These folks are talked about in Omnivore's Dilemma.
- McGrath Family Farm; Field trip destination.
- Slow Food LA; "Supporting good, clean, and fair food production and consumption in Los Angeles."
- Cool Foods Campaign; "The Cool Foods Campaign educates the public about how food choices can affect global warming and empowers them with the resources to reduce this impact. Join our 'Cool Foods' Campaign and help take a bite out of global warming by changing the way you eat."
- Eat Low Carbon; Estimate the footprint of particular meal items by dragging and dropping them onto your plate.
- How to go green in the kitchen This page offers lots of useful tips.
- http://www.eatwild.com/products/california.html Pastured meats directory for California.
Restaurants
- Govinda's 6$, all-you-can-eat vegetarian buffet at the Hare Krishna temple in Palms. The food is very delicious!
- Lucques Gourmet, seasonal, local, organic, sustainable cuisine by Chef Suzanne Goin, who trained at Chez Panisse. Treat yourself and a special someone to a very memorable meal!
- Ford's Filling Station This is another locally renowned restaurant specializing in artisinal, organic, seasonal cuisine. Don't let the prices intimidate you. Wait for a special occasion and treat yourself!
- Chez Panisse Often touted as the place where the organic food movement and California Cuisine were born, Alice Waters' seasonal, local cuisine proved to be a major historical force driving and inspiring the growth of farmers' markets, first in the bay area, then all throughout California and across the country. Located in Berkeley, CA. For more info watch "Food Fight", a documentary about the organic food movement in the US.
Recommended readings and videos: Because social justice, economic, geographical, cultural and other issues are so integrally tied to our relationship with the planet, I've included a variety of books on this list that aren't strictly about the environment or sustainability.
- Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (credited with starting the modern environmental movement)
- Walden by Thoreau (classic account of simple living)
- A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold
- Radical Simplicity by Jim Merkel
- Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown This is about the genocide of native Americans by US govt. and pioneers. An important and interesting but not very happy read.
- The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein This about how free market reforms have been made and what their consequences have been around the world.
- Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond This was made into a pretty good documentary that helps explain some of the economic and technological disparities between developed, technologically advance societies and other not so advanced societies
- Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey This is about Abbey's time in Southern Utah in and around Canyonlands and Arches National Parks. He's an excellent writer. These two parks and the surrounding desert are home to some the most magical and otherworldly landscapes on the planet.
- The Monkey Wrench Gang also by Edward Abbey This is a fictional account of radical activism.
Nature and outdoors:
- National Parks (link to interactive map of all the parks and from there to each park's website)
- Sierra Club "...America's oldest, largest, and most influential grassroots environmental organization."
- Online John Muir exhibit "America's most famous and influential naturalist and conservationist". If you haven't heard of Muir you must check this out!
- Restore Hetch Hetchy! "...a wonderfully exact counterpart" of Yosemite Valley -John Muir; but unfortunately it was dammed in 1923. This site is dedicated to the ongoing fight to restore Hetch Hetchy Valley.
Technology and designs for sustainable living:
- Earthship Biotecture Mike Reynold's company that designs and constructs Earthships.
- Green Home Building Really cool site that summarizes lots of techniques and provides many links for further reading.
- Composting Toilets On the Cheap This guy shows you how to build your own or if you don't feel inclined to do so, how to buy his. Has interesting instructional videos.
- Composting Toilets on the Steep Envirolet's official looking website to sell their toilets. Their systems really are well designed, just too expensive for most.
- Solar ovens Solar ovens use reflective surfaces at different angles to concentrate light from the sun onto a pot of food (beans, soup, roasts, etc.). They are easy and practically free to make.
Energy use:
- Energy Information Administration This is part of the Department of Energy. This link takes you to a summary of statistics on electricity usage for the average American household for 2001 and several other years. There is a VAST amount of information and stats on energy consumption in the U.S. available through this site.
Lifestyle: These sites cover social justice, environmental, and lifestyle choice issues related to sustainable living. They are holistic in that sense. They overlap a bit but content varies surprisingly so check them all out.
- Santa Monica Green Office Buying Guide It says "office" but most of this stuff could work for a home as well.
- Earth Easy Information, suggestions, and products for more sustainable living. Very comprehensive source and quite well organized, but not always scientifically rigorous.
- Mother Earth News News and how-to articles, links and other resources all related to greener living.
- Resources for Life Yet another interesting site about better (more sustainable) living. Lots of links to all sorts of other sites.
- Sustainable living guides A database of several dozen different guides published at different university and college campuses around the country.
- Self Sufficient Living Site about homesteading, gardening, making things you normally buy.
Pets:
- Reduce your dog's footprint Unfortunately this article missed out on an opportunity to address what's really at issue- what your dog eats. Dog food contributes the most to Fido's footprint b/c of what it's made of- chicken and corn. This article focuses on important but less consequential aspects of your mutt's human run lifestyle.
-
Blogging assignment
Everybody will keep a blog related to this course and sustainable living. There is a minimum of 10 blog entries- 4 accompanying exercises 1-4 and 6 related to your project. This covers the writing content of the seminar. The rules are below. Read them VERY carefully:
1. Content of your blog should be course-related only. There are 4 assigned topics and 6 open-ended entries abobut your project. Each posting should be self-explanatory and complete- that means assume you are writing to an educated audience that knows nothing about this course. In other words, entries are not to be rants or ramblings but clear expositions of well-organized thoughts and responses to course content or related topics. You are encouraged to bring in outside sources of information.
2. You must blog about your project during weeks 3-8. That's 6 blog entries, at a minimum about your project. Each entry should be well-edited and presentable before it is posted. Credit for entries is counted at the beginning of each week, which for our purposes will be Mondays. So make sure to entered by the end of every Sunday.
3. Entries should address your ideas, observations, discoveries and experiences that you want to share with others. When you offer opinions, make sure a rationale is clearly given and explicated and that you provide support for them as well.
4. Each entry should be between 300-500 words. That's about 3-5 paragraphs or 1-2 pages of double-spaced, 12 point font in Word.
5. Each entry must strive for quality! That means you have to put some effort into making your blog interesting, creative, informed, and readable. Here are some better examples of blogs that are out there:
http://jeffdhungana.blogspot.com/
http://www.treehugger.com/
http://icanhascheezburger.com/
http://crooksandliars.com/
7. Also, I won't be the only one reading these. Visit and read each others' blogs and leave comments, critiques and suggestions. This will count towards 10% of your participation grade.
8. Assessment of your blog is based on the quality of writing, originality and accuracy of content, its informativeness and whether you complete all blogging assignments. If you think I will: 1. enjoy reading your blog, 2. learn something from it, and 3. see that you are learning something too, well, then you're on the right track!
9. Now that you've read the rules, open an account, then send your classmates and me the address to your blog.
1. Content of your blog should be course-related only. There are 4 assigned topics and 6 open-ended entries abobut your project. Each posting should be self-explanatory and complete- that means assume you are writing to an educated audience that knows nothing about this course. In other words, entries are not to be rants or ramblings but clear expositions of well-organized thoughts and responses to course content or related topics. You are encouraged to bring in outside sources of information.
2. You must blog about your project during weeks 3-8. That's 6 blog entries, at a minimum about your project. Each entry should be well-edited and presentable before it is posted. Credit for entries is counted at the beginning of each week, which for our purposes will be Mondays. So make sure to entered by the end of every Sunday.
3. Entries should address your ideas, observations, discoveries and experiences that you want to share with others. When you offer opinions, make sure a rationale is clearly given and explicated and that you provide support for them as well.
4. Each entry should be between 300-500 words. That's about 3-5 paragraphs or 1-2 pages of double-spaced, 12 point font in Word.
5. Each entry must strive for quality! That means you have to put some effort into making your blog interesting, creative, informed, and readable. Here are some better examples of blogs that are out there:
http://jeffdhungana.blogspot.com/
http://www.treehugger.com/
http://icanhascheezburger.com/
http://crooksandliars.com/
7. Also, I won't be the only one reading these. Visit and read each others' blogs and leave comments, critiques and suggestions. This will count towards 10% of your participation grade.
8. Assessment of your blog is based on the quality of writing, originality and accuracy of content, its informativeness and whether you complete all blogging assignments. If you think I will: 1. enjoy reading your blog, 2. learn something from it, and 3. see that you are learning something too, well, then you're on the right track!
9. Now that you've read the rules, open an account, then send your classmates and me the address to your blog.
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