Students from the Fresno State Sustainability Project will be celebrating Earth Day on April 22 in The Memorial Garden in front of the Kennel Bookstore.
A Sustainability Fair will be held from 10 a.m to 2 p.m. in which students can come and see what the university is doing to help the environment, as well as initiatives that students can do themselves.
“The main focus of the event is to celebrate Earth Day, but we want students to be aware of what’s going on on campus,” said Earth Day student coordinator Kassandra Hishida. “There’s a million different things we want to do, and we just need more student engagement.”
Club president Johnathan Benson said he hopes the fair will get Fresno State students to think about how they can live more sustainably everyday and get others outside the Fresno State community to participate, as well.
Hishida said that another goal for the Sustainability Club is to have as many student organizations in the fair as possible, including the Sun Dogs and the Food Recovery Network.
The Sun Dogs is a solar club on campus composed of engineering students, and the Food Recovery Network is an organization dedicated to reducing food waste.
“They’re doing amazing things, and we want them to be represented at our fair to help students get involved,” Hishida said.
Fresno State’s Sustainability Club struggles with getting students interested in their numerous activities, Hishida said, and they hope that The Earth Day Fair will change that.
“I didn’t even know we had a Sustainability Club,” said mass communication and journalism major Ashlie Day. “I think it’s cool. We have a club dedicated to making the Earth a better place.”
Hishida said that the club is doing much to make the campus more environmentally friendly, but not enough students are aware of its accomplishments.
Some of the other organizations and activities that will be at the fair include: Raw Fresno, a vegan food truck presenting foods made by Fresno-famous chef Naomi Hendrix; Dutch Bros. featuring a B-Y-O-Mug event in which if students bring their own mug, they can get a discount on their favorite drinks; and a Do-It-Yourself booth where students can make their own soaps and upcycle old clothes.
Other events set to take place include sustainability tips and tricks, various Fresno State club booths like the Geology and Nature Club, and a used item drop-off/exchange, where students can bring items they no longer want and drop them off or exchange them for something else. All leftover items will be taken to the Salvation Army.