ECO-CIS was a student-initiated service group founded by me and my friends during our time in Hangzhou during our year-long boarding school program in Hangzhou, China (CISHZ). At ECO-CIS, we aimed to promote environmentally-friendly and sustainable behaviors on the Hangzhou Greentown Yuhua campus.

 

We informed students about the environment through presentations, social media posts, posters. For example, we gave a presentation during a school assembly before a trip to Beijing, reminding students to bring their own water bottles, limit their use of single-use products, and avoid littering. We also designed posters and infographics about food waste and placed them in the cafeteria.

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Additionally, our goal was to identify environmental issues within our school and provide solutions to them, so we also did a lot of research and interviews in regards to where our waste on campus goes, including our food waste, recyclables, and general waste.

 

By practicing urban farming in the school garden and giving our harvested vegetables to the cafeteria for the students to eat, we wanted to demonstrate and promote a sustainable and healthy lifestyle where we could eat locally-grown produce. We even encouraged students to practice gardening on their own by hosting a year-long inter-dorm gardening competition.