Miranda Schildhouse | Contributing Writer

The Footprint Project at Buena Vista University (BVU) is something that is done over the Welcome Weekend before classes begin with the incoming freshmen. Each seminar group is told to come up with an idea that would both benefit the school and the community of Storm Lake by lessening our carbon footprint in the world. Dr. Scott Anderson’s seminar group won the contest. All the seminar classes competed, presenting their ideas to a panel. I was in Dr. Anderson’s group that won.

We came up with several different ideas. We voted on which one we thought would solve environmental problems in the best way and was the most cost effective. Through deductive reasoning and much research, we came up with the Beaver Bag, a reusable shopping bag that has advertisement spots available for local businesses to purchase.

We know grocery stores like Wal-Mart offer discounts when the customer brings in a reusable bag of their own. We worked diligently to find out rough estimates of what it would cost to create the bags. We also contacted some local Storm Lake businesses to see if they would support our idea and give discounts if the bags had their logo on them. We were all so proud when we won the contest against the other seminar groups. Personally, I was optimistic about the whole project.

We split up into smaller groups to tackle research, create the style of bag, and find a way of presenting our idea. Each of us got to know our group better and became closer as friends. We did not only talk about the Footprint Project in our groups, though; We all learned more about each others’ lives and passions.

When approached to write this article, I was asked what my opinion of the project was and if I thought it was helpful. In its own way, it was. Yes, we weren’t playing games constantly and goofing off; we had work to get done, but each seminar teacher had his or her own ways of making the project enjoyable for everyone.

Is doing this project necessary? I’m not sure, but I would recommend continuing the project in years to come. It was a small taste of the work that will be done in classes throughout the year. The people who helped with Welcome Weekend had planned activities we could participate in at night in addition to our seminar work during the day. I can definitely say there was never a dull moment the entire weekend.

Graphic by Aaron Burns