Grass Root Organizations

            Grass Root Organizations play an extremely important role in shaping the community, while also making sure that they are doing everything in their power to improve the overall quality of the environment around them. Members of the Grass Root Organizations often support local causes and efforts to improve many aspects about the community by raising awareness and getting people involved within the community itself. Their main goal is to continue to help communities grow and flourish for people to enjoy generation after generation.

            Grass Root Organizations are more meaningful and sometimes more effective than the average political campaign promise. The members of the organization are actually a part of the community or neighborhood who are willing to put in their own effort and time to achieve a common goal or idea. Grass Root Organizations are gaining in popularity because they handle matters on a more personal level that directly impacts the lives of hundred of people almost immediately. Actions of the Grass Root Organizations can bring communities together because they aim to protect the betterment of the entire community instead of putting money towards projects that are less meaningful and impacting to the community. It is a way for people to be represented and heard without feeling like they are the "Little man" when advocating for a cause. If the issue or cause gets enough support locally, then it could spread even further to be supported by the state governments, and then passed onto the national levels.

           Grass Root Organizations support those who are driven to make an actual and prominent difference in the community. The key to change and improvement starts with a lot of hard work and dedication on a local level. With the right leadership and effort provided, grass root organizations can accomplish more than any government regulated movement. For example, the Ocmulgee River Initiative is a grass roots organization that aims to preserve the overall water quality all along the Ocmulgee River. The organization started locally right here in Macon, GA and now is regulated on a much larger scale. Because the local community members were genuinely concerned with the water quality of the river water around Middle Georgia, the Ocmulgee River Initiative was created to design a program to constantly keep the river as clean as possible. This allows for the river to be more sustainable for future generations while also bringing the community together by raising awareness and making an effort to keep their river as clean as possible for everyone to enjoy for generations to come.
 

Waste Production

         Everyone produces waste in one form or another. You may be the person who can go through 50 napkins in one sitting, or you may be the person who doesn't drink or eat anything unless it is out a prepackaged bottle or container. On April 17, 2014 we were assigned to record and observe just how much waste we go through in one day, and I was actually surprised to see what I discovered.  

In one day I managed to go through the following:

10 bottles of water 
1 bottle of apple juice
2 paper plates
4 plastic utensils
1 granola bar wrapper
~20 sheets of paper
~20 napkins 

          I go through a lot of bottled waters and juices on a daily basis. While on campus, I only like drinking water out of a bottle because I don't particularly like the taste of tap water. With that being said, I typically go through about 8-10 bottles of water a day and recycle all of them at the end of the week.Throughout the years I have discovered that I learn best by rewriting notes or homework problems. This explains why I go through so many sheets of paper on a daily basis. In the past I have retyped my notes that I take in class, but classes like Organic Chemistry are definitely difficult to rewrite on the computer. 

          Based on the waste produced in a single day, here are the amounts of waste I could potentially produce in a full year. 

3,650 bottles of water
365 bottles of juice
730 paper plates
1,460 plastic utensils 
365 granola bar wrappers
~7300 sheets of paper
~7300 napkins

          Using about 3,650 water bottles a year sounds a bit extreme and wasteful even if I am already recycling all the bottles. An easy solution would be to purchase a reusable water bottle that can save me more money and plastic bottles from possibly entering the landfills. I could also purchase some durable and washable plates and silverware instead of having to throw away so many disposable plates and plastic utensils. As for studying, I could still practice my same study habits with the use of a dry erase board. I wouldn't have to go through so many sheets of paper while cutting the cost of purchasing new packs of paper. I believe that with these few simple changes I could learn to be less wasteful and even save a lot of money in the process.