My name is Alexa and I am 19 years old, born and raised in Miami. I graduated from Florida Virtual School, and I am excited to start my second semester at MDC. I plan on achieving my Associates in International Relations and continuing to my Bachelors. I am still unsure of what I want to major in. I have considered journalism, finance, and many other subjects. As I am unsure of a major, I am also unsure of my future career path. Hopefully everything will work out and I achieve a career I enjoy. I am currently taking all online courses including this class, English Comp 2, Math for Liberal Arts 2, and Computer Technology. I plan on attending my home campus, Kendall, next semester.

I enjoy cooking, traveling, listening to music, exercise, and being with my pets. I plan to incorporate all these aspects into my future plans. Traveling as much as possible, discovering new dishes and flavors in other countries, attending concerts, etc. Maybe moving to another state or country would expand my ambitions to explore. Living in a more environmental terrain such as Colorado sounds exciting. I would define success as achieving your biggest and smallest goals while enjoying life.

I am eager to meet all my classmates and I hope everyone has a great semester!

I chose to research pollution at PortMiami. As Prof. Duque mentioned, PortMiami is the cruise capital of the world. Thousands of cruises dock and pass through PortMiami every year. This leads to tons of air pollution, water pollution, waste, and much more. I picked this topic because I would like to learn more about how cruises negatively affect our environment, specifically Miami. I enjoy taking cruises, but I have never thought about how environmentally unfriendly they are. I would like to research ways on how cruise lines can improve themselves so they can reduce waste and pollution in Miami and other cities. 

This article talks about cruise ship pollution in general. It provides the types of waste and the amount of waste produced in a week. Also, cruise regulations and how they have been ignored in the past and recently.  Cruise ships are docked all over the world making cruise pollution a worldwide problem. Some regions have it worse than others such as South Florida.

This article talks about specifically cruise ship pollution in South Florida/Miami. It mentions another major port in South Florida, Port Everglades. Along with PortMiami, Port Everglades is one of the largest, busiest, and most popular ports in the world. These two ports are a major cause for pollution in our city.

This article talks about the steps Miami is taking to reduce pollution. A recent project has been approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. A shore power hookup is being built at Port Miami. This will significantly reduce pollution caused by cruise ships at the port. This is a big step to helping our city.  

CAS 3 was an assignment that allowed me to watch Ted talks on certain environmental issues. I chose to observe clothing waste and how we can find a solution to end it. Before watching both videos, I assumed clothing would be exchanged from stores to thrifts to other people and so on. I never thought an immense amount of clothing was going to waste daily. I also assumed that clothing returned from online orders would be repackaged or donated. After watching the videos, I learned that my expectations were quite wrong. Most unused or returned clothing goes to landfills. Clothing waste is a big problem created by the fashion industry. It negatively impacts our environment. Luckily, both videos provided solutions on how we can slow down this waste. One solution was a clothing exchange app, and the other was to create your own clothes. While both solutions may take a while to implement, they can be very effective to preventing waste.

For SP2, we had to provide an understanding of different research tools. We also had to describe our topic for a future research paper. My experience finding many research tools in the Miami Dade College database was very interesting. There were tons of great websites and tools I could use for different assignments. I was happy to find a website called Kanopy, a streaming service that provides videos/documentaries on different topics. I did not expect to find and use so many helpful tools. My topic for the research paper was pollution at Port of Miami. I felt sad after finding out how harmful cruise emissions are to our environment. Cruises emit tons of waste and toxic emissions. I did not expect to find out how harmful cruises are. They are a fun experience that many enjoy but the environmental effects are not very known to the average person. I also did not expect for there to be a solution which is shore power. I was happy to find out that cruises can run on shore power and how it is being implemented in Port of Miami.

CAS 1 was another assignment that allowed me to watch videos on certain environmental topics. I chose to watch “The Story of Cosmetics” and “The Story of Bottled Water.” The story of cosmetics gives us an inside view of the products that we use daily. These products contain many harmful ingredients and toxins. Big companies like P&G control what we use. This activity made me realize that we all use products even if we do not know what is inside them. We must assume they are healthy for us. The video made me change the way I view the products I use. “The Story of Bottled Water” talks about the history of water production and how much waste is created. Companies used ‘manufacture demand’ to make money from selling plastic water bottles. Advertisements changed the way people chose to drink water. These plastic water bottles continue to end up in landfills and become toxic air pollution. This activity changed the way I perceive water bottle companies. I learned that selling water was never necessary until people learned how to make money from it. This video gave me even more of a reason to continue using a reusable water bottle and to never use a plastic one.

A. “The Story of Cosmetics” begins with Annie Leonard raving about her favorite shampoo. She questions all the long-worded, strange-named ingredients. After getting the product tested, she discovers that it has ingredients linked to cancer. Many of these skin and shower products lead to illnesses and disabilities. Most products are not tested for safety. A few toxic chemicals found in products are carcinogens, neurotoxins, and reproductive toxins. Stores offer you many options for the product you are looking for, but the safety is questionable. Procter & Gamble, P&G, is an example of a corporation that chooses what they put in their products. Laws have not been made to stop this, and the FDA rarely evaluates products. People are fighting for these laws and regulations. Clean and safe products are achievable. We would ultimately feel more comfortable using our products if they were made safely.

A. “The Story of Bottled Water” begins with a comparison between expensive bottled water and tap water. After both were tested, the tap water had better results. The expensive bottled was lower quality and it lost the taste test against tap. Annie Leonard states that people in the U.S. buy more than half a billion bottles of water a week. The use of plastic water bottles began because companies wanted to grow. They used a tactic called ‘manufactured demand.’ They scared people by claiming that tap water was harmful. Then, they advertised the bottles and made it seem like their water comes from pristine valleys and springs. Most of these companies use tap water. Another issue caused by these bottles is an environmental problem. Most empty plastic bottles sit in landfills or become toxic air pollution. On the other hand, tap water is underfunded because people believe it is dirty or undrinkable, which is not true. There are ways to resolve this bottle problem such as boycotting water bottle companies. Luckily, bottle sales have gone down, and many restaurants are offering tap water.

 

“The Story of Cosmetics.” Story of Stuff, 21 July 2010, https://www.storyofstuff.org/movies/story-of-cosmetics/.

“The Story of Bottled Water.” Story of Stuff, 22 Mar. 2010, https://www.storyofstuff.org/movies/story-of-bottled-water/.

lll. Reflection

A. I believe our role as global citizens is to help the planet as much as we can. It can be from as small as picking up litter too as big as creating an environmental organization. As a consumer, it is hard to see the damage you create to the environment and yourself. But it is also easy to see the negative effects we have created together. Pollution, plastic, deforestation, and climate change are a few of the many problems we are facing and creating. It all starts with us. Annie Leonard said we can turn the world’s problems into solutions by understanding the system. Limiting consumption such as recycling and using products fully is a great start. When it comes to helping our planet, every little act counts.

B. After watching “The Story of Stuff” videos, I am inspired to do any task that will help the environment. “The Story of Cosmetics” made me realize the importance of checking the ingredients of products. I will buy natural, safe products instead of buying products filled with toxic chemicals. I will also limit my use of plastic by using reusable items and trying not to buy any products that come in plastic. Recycling is an important process that I will continue to do. “The Story of Water Bottles” made me feel good about using a reusable cup. I will tell people the benefits of using a reusable cup instead of a plastic bottle. These small changes make a huge difference in the long run.

This article by Tony Carnie begins with the process of removing a rhino’s horns. After being drugged, the rhino is laid down and the horns are removed through a humane process. This is being done by veterinarians because over 7,000 rhinos in South Africa have been killed in the past ten years. Certain rhino species are becoming endangered/extinct because of a human desire for rhino horns. Luckily, the process of humanely removing the horns has decreased poaching numbers. It is a costly and time-consuming task, but it is important for the safety of the very few rhinos that are left on earth. Another popular poaching animal is elephants. Trophy hunters retrieve the head, horns, tusks, etc. Chopping off horns is a temporary solution to the problems these hunters cause. 

Article 2: How these dogs protect elephants

This next article by Amy Yee is about Rocco, a Belgian Malinois that is trained to find ivory in airports in Africa. Hundreds of thousands of elephants have been poached in Africa during the last decade. Kenya began implementing strict new laws to make poaching punishable. This brought down poaching numbers significantly, but it is still being smuggled. This is where the trained dogs from the African Wildlife Foundation come in. These dogs have completed 18 busts of ivory in only a couple of months. The dogs are praised when they sniff out specific odors such as ivory. After the dogs detect these criminals, the ivory is examined for authenticity and the smuggler is further prosecuted.

 

Reflection

After looking through the animal welfare section, I chose articles that pertained to poaching. It is a terrifying and heart-breaking topic that needs to be further discussed. These articles gave me an insight into the number of rhinos and elephants that have been poached in the last decade. I was interested in learning about the laws that are set on poaching. I was glad to see that strict laws are enforced towards trophy hunters. Seeing the small number of these animals left and the reasons why trophy hunters kill made me upset. The need for these animal parts such as heads and tusk is confusing and unnecessary. I was happy to see the ways people and dogs are preventing this. Learning about these veterinarians and dog training programs gave me hope for the future of animals. I have a deep love for animals, and I hope people will continue to do more to eliminate poaching and trophy hunting. Solutions journalism provided articles that raise awareness and contain accurate information. It was easy to find a certain topic and it contained many subjects that are not highly discussed in the media. They provide not only negative and doubtful media but also positive and eye-opening articles. I would love to learn more on this topic and find ways to help.

 

References

Carnie, Tony. “How Chopping off Their Horns Helps Save Rhinos from Poachers.” The Guardian, Guardian   News and Media, 31 May 2018, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/31/how-chopping-off-their-horns-helps-save-rhinos-from-poachers?utm_source=Solutions%2BStory%2BTracker.

Yee, Amy. “How These Dogs Protect Elephants.” Animals, National Geographic, 27 April 2016, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/160427-   kenya-wildlife-service-sniffer-dogs-smuggled-ivory-airport-port-elephant-poaching.

This TedTalk explains the wasteful process of returning clothes from online shopping. Aparna Mehta, a global solutions director for retail and personal consumer, constantly purchased clothing online in multiple sizes and colors with free returns in mind. She wondered where all these clothes were returned to, so she researched it. She discovered that four billion pounds of clothing end up in landfills every year. She also saw that companies provide free returns for more sales, but this leads to more returns and loss in sales. She created a solution called a ‘green turn.’ This sends returned items to the next consumer. Mehta tells consumers to think before shopping. Fewer returns would leave millions of pounds of clothing out of landfills.   

Mehta, Aparna. “Where Do Your Online Returns Go?” Aparna Mehta: Where Do Your Online Returns Go? | TED Talk, July 2018, https://www.ted.com/talks/aparna_mehta_where_do_your_online_returns_go.

 

This TedTalk shares how to grow your own clothes using microbes and different ingredients. Suzanne Lee, a fashion designer, discovered a way to use green tea, sugar, and microbes to create clothing. Mixing these ingredients creates a thick sheet with layers. After air drying, this sheet becomes a light paper/leather and can be sewn together. The clothes can be stained with fruits and vegetables to become colorful. It is not yet water-resistant, but the process does not create waste. It can even be made from waste. It is also biodegradable for when it is no longer needed or in use. Lee states that it is not yet a material replacement but the start of a sustainable solution.

Lee, Suzanne. “Grow Your Own Clothes.” Suzanne Lee: Grow Your Own Clothes | TED Talk, Mar. 2011, https://www.ted.com/talks/suzanne_lee_grow_your_own_clothes.

 

Reflection

Waste is a huge problem we are currently dealing with and contributing towards. The fashion industry is one of the biggest contributors to pollution in the world. I did not know that returned clothing items ended up in landfills. I always assumed the clothes went back to the company and were repackaged or discounted. Mehta’s TedTalk made me realize the huge effect the fashion industry has on our planet’s health. I believe this is a fixable problem. Hopefully, more solutions will be made and implemented to prevent clothing waste.

A great solution to combat clothing waste is to grow your own clothes like Lee. It is not a full solution, but it does help prevent waste and use waste. Learning about Lee’s clothing-making process with microbes was very interesting. I did not know a certain material could be made from kombucha and other ingredients. It goes to show that many items can be made in an environmentally friendly way. Sustainable fashion is important because of the negative impact the fashion industry is leaving on the planet. If we can find ways to help our environment, every small change matters. These two TedTalks left a lasting impression on me. I will continue to learn how myself and others can become more environmentally conscious.

The video I chose “The problem with fur” talks about the negative effects of the fur industry. Fur from animals such as minks have been used to make clothing for centuries. These clothes have always been used as a status symbol. Most fur items are being used for fashion, not for warmth.

Fur coats are a popular item in Russia. Mink skin is used the most to make fur items. Fur farms kill millions of animals and produce large amounts of toxic greenhouse gas emissions. Not only are innocent animals killed but the process is extremely harmful to the environment. Also, escaped animals from fur farms are considered invasive species which affects the area around them.

Faux fur is a fake fur that is a great replacement for real fur. An added benefit of faux fur is its versatility. With the many winter jackets on the market, there is no need for fur. Luckily, many brands prohibit the use of fur. It is also starting to become illegal in some countries. The banning and illegality of using fur should continue. After watching this video, I will continue to support companies that don’t use real fur. I will also support leaders and legislators that have a strong supportive view on animal welfare.