Students passing through the Diag today may see more garbage than usual.
A display of trash, designed to draw attention to wastefulness on campus, will be set up from noon to 6 p.m. as part of Earthweek, which starts today and runs through Earth Day, April 22.
The Michigan Student Assembly's Environmental Issues Commission is sponsoring the week of Earth awareness under the theme "Love your mother, there is no other."
The Environmental Issues Commission, with help from various other student organizations, hopes to emphasize the importance of conserving the Earth's resources, with various participatory events planned throughout the week, including today's Critical Mass Bike Ride and tomorrow's day of environmental service, "Hands on the Planet."
"Earthweek this year is very, very inclusive. We have many (new) events sponsored by lots of different kinds of groups," SNRE junior Mona Hanna said. Hanna, chair of the Environmental Issues Commission, an umbrella group for all environmental organizations on campus.
"We have people ranging from the College Republicans having events, to Project Serve," Hanna said.
Although this year's Earthweek activities were planned later in the year than last year's events, organizers said they hope students will take time out from studying to learn about taking care of the environment. "We're hoping this is the beginning of a community environmental movement on campus," said SNRE senior Ami Grace, a member of Environmental Action at the University.
Grace said one of the things ENACT will be involved in during the week is gathering the junk mail students in residence halls receive, such as J. Crew catalogs, and sending them back to the corporations.
"We're doing things like the junk mail campaign," she said. "We're going to count the junk mail and then we're going to write a letter to the ... different organizations and say, 'This is how much you waste.'"
Hanna said she is excited about today's Critical Mass Bike Ride. "This was started in San Francisco ... as a means for people to use alternatives to cars," she said. "We want to get as many people as possible ... promoting alternatives to cars."
The cyclists will meet on the Diag at 4:30 p.m. and bike around Ann Arbor, Hanna said.
Lisa Baker, associate vice president for university relations, said the University is enthusiastic about upcoming Earthweek events.
"The University welcomes students' input on environmental issues and I think people will be interested in seeing all of the planned activities," she said.
The University plans to give chlorine-free paper a trial run in the computing sites in the Michigan Union and Dana Hall, in honor of Earthweek. Producing chlorine paper pollutes nearby waterways and causes other environmental problems, Hanna said.