Earth Month is going to look a little different this year, but COVID-19 isn’t going to stop us from celebrating the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. We are going to postpone the personal document shredding/electronic recycling event to a future date, but we will still have it. So, if the changes to your weekend plans includes some spring cleaning, keep all your electronics, techno trash, batteries, eyeglasses, and paper for the big event. See details on what we will and won’t accept.
We still hope to have free trees to share for Arbor Day, and if so, we’ll find a way to do that while keeping everyone safe.
We are still having the RePurpose It contest. We know that recent events may have changed things, so we have extended the submission deadline to April 6. Don’t forget that you can enter more than one item. Also, while the project needs to be done by you, it doesn’t have to be done by only you. If you have kids (or spouse?) that needs a project while they are at home, and they want to do most of the work, that’s great. Don’t overthink this — just find something that’s outlived its original purpose, and find a different way to use it. Check out our webpage for rules and helpful hints and our Pinterest page for inspiration.
We also have set up an EcoChallenge team. It’s free, and entirely online. You get to pick the topics and actions you want to participate in (which can be changing a habit, learning about a new topic or completing a single action) to earn points. EcoChallenge also gives out prizes. Not only can you join our team — anyone can. So if you have kids, friends, family, neighbors and so on that you think would be interested, we’d love to have them on our team. The University of Nebraska at Omaha has officially challenged us to a battle, and we need to defend our title.
We also will be doing our first ever online scavenger hunt. You’ll be able to participate at your convenience, and everything will be online. Participation will help you learn more about sustainability, as well as campus programs and successes. We’ll have lots of prizes to hand out for this, too. Scavenger hunt items will be posted on this page on April 6.