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Exploring Sustainability Through Service Learning

Students in Farrah Grant's "Intro to Sustainability" course explored sustainability topics through hands-on service learning experiences.

In many ways, there’s no better icebreaker than sorting through bags of trash with your new classmates. Not only does the tactile and sensory (smelly) nature of it make a lasting impression, but the service also requires teamwork and collaboration that lasts throughout the semester and helps the lessons stick.

Farrah Grant, M.A., has incorporated service learning into her “Intro to Sustainability” course (SUST 1000), which to date offers several sections per semester, for about four years. The students learn how to analyze sustainability issues at the system level, identify cultural and accessibility changes required to make an impact, and dig deeper into specific topics like food waste and landfills.

“Inherent in sustainability is action and doing and transformative change, so I feel I can't teach sustainability without practicing it,” Grant says. “That's why it's important to get students doing that hands-on work, so they see the impacts of what they're reading about. This learning isn't passive, and it doesn't end here.”

In this experience, the students took a day’s worth of trash from the Milo Bail Student Center, including more than 20 bags that were destined for the landfill and one bag intended for recycling. They spent their time sorting the trash into five waste streams: traditional recycling, Hefty recycling (for harder-to-recycle plastics), compost, glass, and landfill.

“It’s one thing to read about how much food waste there is, or even to watch a documentary about it. But there’s something about actually sorting through the trash and seeing first-hand how much of it can be diverted to other places, that really makes an impact,” says Emily Ernst, a junior environmental science major. “I appreciate this class for helping me think more critically about my choices because every single one makes a difference.”

Before I learned what I know now, I did not have any idea what sustainability even was. Now I am aware that it is the vision of creating a brighter world for future generations while still meeting the needs of the current population.

 Joey Heavican, a freshman biology major
Data shared after the waste sort by Kristina Hughes, Sustainability Coordinator at UNO, showed that when properly sorted, more than 85% of materials that were destined for the landfill had the potential to be diverted.

“Our campus sustainability goal is to be zero-waste by 2030,” Hughes says. “This means that we want more than 90% of the materials coming from campus to be diverted into other waste streams like compost, recycling, glass, etc. This exercise showed UNO has the potential to be zero-waste if we all do our part to properly sort our materials.”

The project didn’t end with the waste sort on the UNO campus; the class also partnered with Blackburn High School to share lessons learned. The UNO students taught the high school students how to perform a waste sort and gave presentations on how Omaha Public Schools could incorporate composting into the curriculum. Blackburn hosts both a Horticulture Academy that teaches basic gardening skills and advanced techniques like hydroponics, as well as a Culinary Academy that focuses on nutrition and culinary techniques. The sustainability topics covered by the UNO students, especially those related to food waste and composting, fit in nicely. And with this added partnership, the UNO students gained some leadership experience along the way.

“Seeing the students take ownership of this project, that's the kind of educational experience that I strive for,” Grant says. “[Service learning] is so rewarding from a teaching perspective. These experiences are changing the way students think about and perceive the world.”

Interested in incorporating service learning into your own course? Learn more about UNO's Service Learning Faculty Fellows or reach out to the Service Learning Academy directly to get started.