Journal 7: FGCU Green Campus Tour!

I am very proud to say that I am a Florida Gulf Coast University Student, because this campus is fighting everyday to become a sustainable campus. Some "green" improvements that FGCU has made since opening the school are installing the "Big Belly" trash compactors, recycling, cooling system, solar panels, campus draining system, and overall structure of the buildings. Since the school is growing rapidly, more efforts have been made to keep up the "green" campus lifestyle. Listening to the Physical Plant presenters and going on the campus tour has made me more aware of the natural beauty on campus and how much work is put into being an environmentally friendly campus.

The cooling system at FGCU! It saves the campus money by freezing at night and then using the melted water to cool down the  classrooms. Since the campus has grown so much over the past few years, they want to add on to this cooling system, so that the campus keeps saving its money

The Physical Plant presenters gave us a lot of information before our tour about the campus. The Physical Plant helps with the environmental aspects of the campus. Some of the programs that they have helped to start up are Eagles <3 Tap Water, Turn Me Off, and FGCU Recycles. They have gone and put spigots on the water fountains for the students to fill up reusable bottles, placed recycling bins all over campus, made efforts to expand the cooling system, and installed things like the "Big Belly" to help insure the environmental sustainability of the campus. This is the Physical Plants main website just in case you would like to read up on these items or any of the other efforts being made by this department: http://admin.fgcu.edu/phyplant/homepage.htm.

 On the tour we walked out to the courtyards. Here we observed the "Big Belly" trash compactors that the presenters had talked about. Even these trash compactors make a difference. They compact the trash so that there are less frequent trash pick up days and there are no plastic bags to worry about. We also admired how nice the courtyard was, because it provided a ,perfect shaded, study area for students while they waited for their classes to start. It was shaded thanks to the many trees planted by FGCU. Some of the trees that were pointed out were the Cabbage Palm, White Oak, and Slash Pine Tree. These trees not only provide shade for the students, but they also provide shelter and food for the wild animals that live on campus. Walking through the breezeway, are attention was brought to the rocks that had been placed along the side of buildings on campus. These rocks were put there to be a drainage system and to prevent erosion. I had always thought they had been placed around the buildings for decoration.

Zebra Longwing Butterfly

The final two stops were to the water. When we stoped at the bench by the lake, our professor told us that FGCU is trying to plant a White Oak Tree beside every bench that they install. While observing the water we saw the Zebra Longwing Butterfly and the Spatter Dock. I observed so many different plants and animals around the FGCU campus on this tour.

Spatter Dock

 Even before this "Green" campus tour I knew that FGCU was striving to have a our campus be environmentaly sustainable, but since touring I got a first hand look at all of the ways they have helped this campus reach some of its goals. Even though living sustainably is an ongoing event, it is still nice to be going to a school that is aware of the environment and finds ways to insure that they stay this way, even though the campus is growing at such a fast pace. Overall, the tour was very informative and inspiring.