The Environmental Action Committee is a new student organization focusing on environmentally positive change within Auburn University.
“Our major change we want to make is to make Auburn University the most environmentally sound and sustainable campus as possible,” said Dalton Nelson, president of EAC and senior in agriscience education and agriculture science.
Nelson said EAC hopes to achieve the organization’s mission by promoting the use of solar panels, better waste management systems and other sustainability acts on Auburn’s campus.
Hayden Parrish, vice president of EAC and senior in natural resource management and sustainability, said he met Nelson when they were co-workers at Mountain High Outfitters during the summer.
They developed the idea of EAC because they felt there wasn’t any group advocating for environmentally-positive change on campus, aside from a few small clubs.
According to Nelson, he became passionate about sustainable living and reducing the impact he had on the environment when he hiked the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine in 2017. Nelson said he was interested in recycling and small-scale efforts to reduce his environmental footprint before hiking the trail.
He hiked the Appalachian Trail for 157 days, travelling from Georgia to Maine. He said that while thousands of people attempt hiking the whole trail, only around 17 percent of those actually complete it.
“There’s a principle in the woods called ‘LNT: Leave No Trace,’” Nelson said. “That means leave only a footprint and take a picture. Don’t litter, don’t move things around, don’t take what’s not yours.”
Nelson said he believes that if the same principle was applied at Auburn University, it would be a better campus.
Parrish said his father was in the Air Force during his childhood, so he moved to different areas around the United States and saw how different cultures approached environmentally conscious activity.
Parrish said that while he spent his middle school and high school years not caring about his environmental impact, he became more proactive when he went to college, where he could reinvent himself without any outside influence.
Parrish said he hopes to work for an environmental non-profit, and his dream job would be working at Patagonia because of its business practices.
Parrish said he believes the biggest issue facing environmental sustainability is consumer culture. He said he would rather work to try to change that culture instead of going into government or local policy.
“Every article of clothing, every piece of food you eat has some kind of environmental cost,” Parrish said.
Nelson & Parrish decided to call EAC a committee as opposed to a club because they wanted the club to focus on its members.
According to Parrish, Mike Kensler, director of the Office of Sustainability, said that he has seen many environmental organizations come and go on campus, but he believes EAC will make a difference because they are putting students first.
“We feel that when the students have the power to voice their opinions and when they come forward, that’s when change around town and around campus can actually be enacted,” Parrish said.
Nelson said he wants a diverse group of people to participate in EAC. Members will be able to choose projects they are interested in or propose ideas if a project doesn’t serve that purpose and devote their time on that instead of what doesn’t interest them.
EAC will have a meeting on Oct. 2, and they plan on having an open-floor discussion for members to bring ideas for projects. They plan on having meetings the first Tuesday of every month.
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