It was a noble effort, but after hundreds of petition-signers approved an initiative to re-institute a recycling policy at Skyline High School, the cause might simply go down the drain until brought up again.
In April 2008, Skyline’s Environmental Club, headed by adviser Ms. Nelson and President Connie Kim, found itself planting the notion of administrative injustice into the minds of fellow peers who once thought that the recycle bins distributed around the school. Members Jordan Faires and Monica Ng were the ones responsible for student awareness of the “trashy news,” as Faires once referred to it, and the group seemed to have support within the school populous.
With these supporting inscriptions the group thought it was on its way to mending a broken policy, but the plans seemed to be rolled in green tape. The administration, who then became responsible for the implementation of said programs stalled, and the group never saw its hopes fulfilled.
Unfortunately, the group went about the practices incorrectly, being submissive and almost-courteous when attempting to reform a policy that each member is surely passionate about.
The group — primarily composed of a close-knit group of friends with limited experience in civil disobedience — used age-old principles to attempt to get its point across. What they didn’t realize was that democracy is idealistic, and more-radical, angst-filled actions are needed in this day and age to succeed. The club needed a striking blow to the ego and frugality of the Issaquah School District, but sadly they never took that step.
Granted, it wouldn’t have been easy to complete. The only way to surely enable a victory is to have the majority participate, and in our submissive world such events are nearly impossible to obtain. But, that isn’t to say it couldn’t happen. Many doubted the Southern African Americans who boycotted Montgomery busses in 1955, but they were able to overcome by depleting the resources of the company. The Environmental Club needed its relative bus boycott, and here lie a couple of methods in which they could have obtained their goals and not just settle for the fact that it is now out of their hands, as the administration likely has little fervor to push this through.
1. A Lunch-wide Refusal to Dispose of Recyclable Goods
This may seem drastic and would be difficult to harbor support for, but it could be terribly effective. If the group covertly planted members and told reliable lunch peers to leave all of their recyclable materials (plastic water bottles, food trays, ect.) on the tables at the end of lunch, it could be a flagrant sign that the students are unhappy with the school policy. It is risky, but with total support it wouldn’t be so. Then again, it is improbable that any of the leaders of Environmental Club would have the guts to do it (as it is our form of ecoterrorism).
2. Disposing of Recycle Bin’s Contents Into the Trash Can
This would be one of the fun ones to watch. If Environmental Club could get somebody bold, somebody like a Mike Chen, to go over to the recycle bin and simply remove the lid and pour its contents into the trash (preferably in the middle of the cafeteria), it would seriously rouse awareness of the club’s cause. This method is arguably less risky than the last, and could be masked under the guise of trying to help the janitorial staff.
3. Defacement of the Trash Can
Defacement, or vandalism, often carry a negative annotation,` but in this case would be harmless. There wouldn’t be RECYCLE graffiti on the side of the trash bins, nor would there be a trash can fire. Rather, the group could go by and simply tape over the can-sized hole on the lid, blocking any chance of truly recycling, or they could tape a piece of paper on the trash can saying “might as well just throw it away.” The point of this method would be to promote the cause to those who haven’t heard, and this is likely the least risky of the three.
Though arguably the biggest change that needs to be made on behalf of the club is the mentalities of the members. Many are too worried to get into trouble, many are too worried to speak their mind to authority. If Mark Rudd, former leader of the Students for a Democratic Society, hadn’t challenged the higher-ups at Columbia University, our free-spirited liberalism might not be alive and well today. Rudd is now considered by many to be a pivotal member of the late-twentieth century.
Why shouldn’t we all make that change? Why shouldn’t we stand up to injustice?
Learn More About Skyline’s Environmental Club at their website.
Comments
True, but as an official club we can’t really start a program based on civil disobedience. Although there could have been more efforts to raise awareness, we did the best we could with what little time we had.
It isn’t true vandalism. All would be easily reversible. A taped paper on top of the trash cans is the closest thing, but they couldn’t punish you for that.
And on the topic of time, it seemed to drop off by the end of the year. The push was in April, and May and June’s progress was stagnant. That is MORE than enough time. Don’t they do Site Council once a year?
First of all I have a few corrections:
In April 2008, Connie Kim had not been elected President. Instead we had our “Co-Presidents” Katie Purdy and Monica Ng. We have since abolished the “Co-Presidency” and stuck with the good ol’ notion of single-Presidency in order to stream-line and centralize authority within the club.
Since the author of this article was not a member of Environmental Club and interviewed only one former member of the organization, I’m not surprised that several statements into this article were woefully presumptuous.
The Environmental Club was established by Katie Purdy at the beginning of the school year in 2007 and elections did not begin until October. By this time, the organization already had to wait several months to be approved by the student council. Impatient with the slow proceedings, the club met illegally (according to ASB rules) several times.
A fledgling club does not hope to perform any acts of civil disobedience within the first year of its inception, nor was the organization capable of such acts without risking damnation from school authorities and ASB officers.
As a new club, we were mostly concerned with ensuring the club’s continued existence so that in the future, students could make a difference. We also had the greatest respect for our advisor, Mrs. Nelson, who would most certainly recieve flack for any move made against the strict rules set down for Skyline clubs and organizations.
“Sticking it to the man”, being bold, civil disobedience—all were simply not possible at such an early stage.
I would challenge the author of this article to become a member of Environmental Club. Perhaps with such bold ideas, he might be willing to become the figurehead of our civil disobedience movement. But in the meantime, the officers of Environmental Club will stick to establishing itself without risking death of the organization we are so passionate about.
Some constructive criticism for the author of this article: If you want to be an amateur journalist, do your research! You do yourself no credit by assuming you know the intimate details of a group “primarily composed of a close-knit group of friends”.
Nicely done Honor. You express my sentiments exactly. This article represents bad journalism if anything.
Criticizing the club’s past efforts won’t help. I suggest that the author looks more into the reason why Skyline High School did not participate in King County’s Green School Program when 9 other schools within the Issaquah School District did. By the way, I would also like to add that this “close-knit group of friends” is composed of Skyline’s finest students.
Honor: The point of this article, I believe, was to focus on the outcome of the club’s efforts. The internal structure of the club or rationale behind the actions taken are secondary details with respect to the more important idea: the plan didn’t work. Bill feels like the club played it too safe to be effective. I don’t know if he felt this way all along, but in retrospect, I have to agree.
Personally I think petitioning is a good first attempt, but since that didn’t work it’s a shame to see the cause go down without a fight. As you have explained, there are reasons why Environmental Club is selectively choosing it’s battles. I’m glad you contributed those.
Hawkins Duo: Ouch. I don’t think this is poor journalism as much as the bookend to a discussion. Clearly, the article spurred a conversation that—with your contributions—encompasses a more complete set of viewpoints. Nonetheless, we were (and still are) in our infancy and criticism is appreciated. We can take it.
Anonymous: Finest students? What does that make the rest of us?
Hawkins Duo: I will admit that civil disobedience is a bold move to take for a fledgling club, but you missed the key point of the article (as Alex stated): Environmental Club’s efforts did absolutely nothing and were way too safe to cut through all the red tape that blindfolds the Skyline administration. The effort may have been noble, but it was abandoned once it reached the seemingly forgetful hands of the administrators.
All of the facts came from the official Environmental Club meeting notes, and although I probably should have done a little fact check with Jordan (who was in Mexico at this time), I didn’t. That was poor journalism — I understand that, but the article itself was not. By the way, it seems as if the only thing I had wrong was the origins of the club — which weren’t even in question.
Thank you, and goodnight.
What angered me most about this article was that Environmental Club was being blamed for doing, as Mr. Dow kindly said in his last comment, “absolutely nothing”. If he had talked to any member of the club instead of simply reviewing our club agenda notes, he would understand that going for the school district’s neck was in no way realistic. To attack the administration requires a lot of support from the student body that we just weren’t getting. In terms of our club goals, we did more than “absolutely nothing”—we recruited new members, ensured that our club would continue to exist and set up a governing body.
To outside critics, it would seem that our club did little to put a stop to our school’s environmental trespasses but no member or officer would say that we did “absolutely nothing”. All felt that we accomplished a great deal in terms of our club goals and establishment.
I am glad that I made a comment because it was in the spirit of journalism to make corrections and start a discussion. I just hope that the author might have the courtesy to write a more thorough follow-up piece so as not to mislead his readers.
I am only the webmaster of Environmental Club, but I assure you that the new regime of Environmental Club will not let the school district silence us! I have great faith in our new officers and perhaps with this publicity we can recruit more members to our cause.
And even though I corrected information that wasn’t in question, anything you publish should be accurate or corrected. It isn’t “bad” journalism, it’s just a little sloppy.
I also want to say that I don’t mean to criticize the effort you have put into this publication. Overall I am very impressed with the articles and the website. I am really glad that people other than the journalism students have the opportunity to write about Skyline news. Plus, you guys have a great array of national and international news articles, sports and culture.
Other than the few mistakes I caught in this article, its all excellent.
P.S. I linked this article to our website.
This article is kind of amusing. Bill, you should join Environmental Club. I also want to add that I know it’s easy to say that the club played it too safe, but unfortunately, there are rules that you have to follow in order to get things done. These rules are stupid, but it’s our only way of making changes.
Thank you for the article Mr.Dow, I hope that your piece will spark a re-evaluation of Skyline Environmental Club’s tactics concerning our work and interface with the student body and administration. In the next year we hope to take your opinions and comments into consideration. Meetings are every other Tuesday in Ms.Nelson’s room and we hope to see you (and other concerned environmentalists) there.