Gardens and Green Grades

I'll admit that until this semester I had never spent time in the F.E.A.S.T. garden. hidden near UEPI, it is easy to forget that its even there. Yet for prospective students a college's green rating is becoming more important. So why not make more effort to showcase Oxy's garden and expand it to the proposed site near Rangeview? A larger garden site would contribute to Oxy's green reputation and provide more room for students to become involved in the garden. In addition, last year, I hosted a prospective student who was impressed by the orange trees outside of Haines and disappointed to learn that they do not produce edible fruit. A new proposal to plant fruit trees on campus would not only result in edible fruit but would make oxy more attractive to visiting students. Much of the time, green initiatives are seen as tradeoffs between sustainability and cost or other concerns. Therefore, ways in which Oxy can become more sustainable and more attractive to prospective students should be taken advantage of. While Oxy’s green report card score from the Sustainable Endowments Institute has been improving, there is still much that can be done to make the campus more sustainable.
As for the proposed garden site, this effort is stuck waiting for approval from the administration and unfortunately there are those who seem opposed to the idea. The process of finding information about the potential fruit trees is also slow. But, to some extent I expected these kinds of difficulties. What I didn’t really foresee, despite my own limited experience with the garden, was the lack of student awareness of the current garden. While many students express interest in the garden and other sustainable projects on campus many have never spent time there or even may not know where it is. It seem that people feel that it is hidden away and they don’t know much or anything about the garden. While the proposed additional location would make the garden more visible, an increase in student involvement with the current garden might also be necessary to demonstrate why there should be an additional location. Because progress with new garden site has slowed, this unexpected issue of raising awareness of both the current garden and the proposal to expand it has become the biggest challenge.