A group of students from the University of the Southern Caribbean, Guyana Extension Site, on Monday launched an environmental club at their campus in Queenstown, Georgetown, under the theme “Transforming Lives while keeping the Environment Clean”.
What started out as a simple class project given to students by their lecturer as part of their course outline, sparked an idea that turned into this initiative.
Site coordinator Mignon Maynard-Sandford said the course exposed the students to the major issues facing Guyana and the wider world as it relates to pollution and its effects, and this fuelled their interest in the role they can play in the preservation of the environment.
She said they very quickly learnt that the environment “is everybody’s business” and hence this initiative was born.
According to Maynard-Sanford, USC will continue to support its students in all their endeavours.
President of the USC Guyana site, Wanda Gibson, said that the students are enthusiastically committed to completing the formation of the club.
They embarked on their journey with the aim to “keep the surroundings clean and sensitize the public on the importance of a healthy environment.”
When their idea materialized, the students had a packed portfolio that included a cleanup campaign in the Queenstown area, now completed, the distribution of bins around Georgetown, erecting environmental signs, and creating a website.
The club intends to hold discussions or sessions soon to sensitize individuals, including representatives from the mining sector.
The ultimate goal, Gibson said, is to “get everybody on board.”
Among those in attendance at the small forum for the launching of the environmental club were representatives from ECO, EPA, the LEO Club, President of the Guyana Conference of Adventists, Pastor Richard Avert James, and Georgetown Mayor Hamilton Green.
Green told the students that they are the “architects of change in the world” and he applauded the young students “for taking this bold step.”
However, Green went beyond the concept of the environment in terms of “just picking up paper, but in its general wider sense.” He urged the students and others gathered to look at the environment in its totality, “in terms of things that can determine if we develop and how we develop, and what is necessary to fulfill God’s initial intention of how he wants us to use our environment.”
The mayor said that the concept of care for the environment “came from God and if we stick to spirituality, we cannot go wrong.”
He said leaders in the past have made mistakes when dealing with the environment and this has resulted in great damage.
He cited World Wars 1 and 2 as the first mistake, which he said saw the creation of new missiles through advances in technology, in particular the atomic bomb that left thousands dead and devastated a part of Japan, signs of which are still evident today.
Green said destruction to the environment started with the creation of technology and as much as technology is constructive, it is often used for potentially harmful or destructive means.
He then pointed to the creation of plastics and Styrofoam, which initially met with much pomp and approval, but unfortunately these substances are today major contributors to pollution.
“Yes they are good. But they need to be controlled.”
Green expressed the view that “man’s intervention of the environment is not in keeping with what the creator set out.”
“Georgetown, unfortunately, has already been partly destroyed, even to my best efforts.”
He spoke of the actions of previous national leaders who “compromised the environment.” He listed the area where Merriman Mall is now located which had been a free-flowing canal. The mayor said such actions result in clogging and improper drainage as is evident in that area today.
“Where development takes place, there must be a sensitization of the environment,” Green opined.
He also urged the USC students to make the public aware of the effects of pollution, and emphasized the importance of a proper moral upbringing which will influence their decision-making about issues such as littering.
