I found that the biggest take-away from this course was the importance of collaboration and recognizing the strengths of others. Of course, the entire certificate is based around the idea of ‘interdisciplinary collaboration’, but it was truly in this course that I felt the truth and meaning in the phrase. When explaining the course and what we do, I always find myself explaining the importance of sustainability in all fields, not just stem-related majors. In this course, it was really amazing to see all these people from different fields and majors coming together and meeting, something that would have not occurred otherwise. I felt like this course did a good job of asking me to bring my knowledge from previous courses in the final capstone project. It is one thing to learn, and it is a completely new thing to implement and actually get hands-on experience, especially with real companies and groups on campus where we can physically see the things we work on come into fruition. I think that my perception of the world has changed a lot in the course of taking these classes for the certificate, I am now so much more mindful of the way I operate in the world on a day to day basis. It does not matter if I am going out to eat or working, I always find myself looking for ways to ‘close the loop’ and I hope to keep that mentality with me. For example, my roommate and I became so sustainably focused that at the catering company we both worked at, we implemented recycling, something so simple that had never even been considered. It started with us taking all of the recyclables ourselves in the trunk of my car, after events. It eventually became the norm, and soon enough our event leads were recycling for us. In addition to this, after some discussions about sustainability and its importance, our boss began an herb garden for the kitchen, taking up his own personal interests. I think that this class also helped me shift my thinking from a more entitled point to based more around the community, and serving everyone as a whole. Oftentimes, I think we are subliminally taught to look out only for ourselves, and it is hard to take a step back and see just how damaging this ideology can be. It is so important, I think, to change this, and through simple observations of nature and sustainability, one can see just how helpful it is to stop focusing on individual details and instead look at the whole picture. I hope to continue to foster this ideology in the future.
