Sustainability Policy and Events, Context and Purpose, Activity
“Decreased Brain Volume in Adults with Childhood Lead Exposure”. Cecil KM, Brubaker CJ, Adler CM, Dietrich KN, Altaye M, et al. Public Library of Science (PLoS) Medicine Vol. 5, No. 5, e112 doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.0050112.
In 2018 students at Boston University in a class entitled “Research for Environmental Agencies and Organizations” found only twelve states acting to help communities to remove water pipes made of lead, and after contacting all municipalities in the state to find out what they were doing, received replies from only ten percent. Even though the story of lead in Flint, Michigan’s water is now well-known (for a highly readable account see Dr. Mona Hannah-Attisha’s What the Eyes Don’t See), the response remains slow and inadequate. A hopeful note, however, was the conversation students had with Sioux Falls, South Dakota, which had a special initiative to remove lead water service lines. The water superintendent told them the work caused no increase in water rates:
With the exception of fuel, equipment wear and tear, brass and copper pipe the only additional cost was the rental of a mini excavator. We budget for one every few years so some years we rent one and some years we don’t. The maintenance team we have either removing lead lines or other maintenance tasks. We managed to perform all work necessary even with the lead line removal initiative. (See Replacing Lead Water Service Lines in Massachusetts at www.bu.edu/rccp, p.5).
Maybe not every water department has the same situation as Sioux Falls. But even when the costs of replacement are high, the value of taking action far exceeds them. On March 5 the Environmental Defense Fund’s Chemicals Policy Director Tom Neltner reported that Minnesota’s Department of Health found that just “the societal benefits from avoiding the loss of IQ points due to children’s exposure to lead” were worth ten times the costs of removing lead service lines (http://blogs.edf.org/health/).
With the exception of fuel, equipment wear and tear, brass and copper pipe the only additional cost was the rental of a mini excavator. We budget for one every few years so some years we rent one and some years we don’t. The maintenance team we have either removing lead lines or other maintenance tasks. We managed to perform all work necessary even with the lead line removal initiative. (See Replacing Lead Water Service Lines in Massachusetts at www.bu.edu/rccp, p.5).
Maybe not every water department has the same situation as Sioux Falls. But even when the costs of replacement are high, the value of taking action far exceeds them. On March 5 the Environmental Defense Fund’s Chemicals Policy Director Tom Neltner reported that Minnesota’s Department of Health found that just “the societal benefits from avoiding the loss of IQ points due to children’s exposure to lead” were worth ten times the costs of removing lead service lines (http://blogs.edf.org/health/).
It is reasonable to assume that society will be more likely to take action to eliminate the problem of lead poisoning if it sees the value of doing so – that support for investments grow when people understand that there will be a good payback. When students take the opportunity of focusing the research they do in universities on such real-world problems, and learn, for example, that a city like Sioux Falls can do lead pipe removal with no rate increase at all, they can play a role in removing barriers to doing the right thing. That is not abstract education, it is learning with purpose. The client for the project was the organization Clean Water Action, and the information will be put to use.
The class “Research for Environmental Agencies and Organizations” grew out of my pro-bono supervision of independent work by students interested in tackling real problems, and has included such topics as toxics in hair products, transforming environmental justice neighborhoods into green communities, clean energy (electric vehicle charging, community choice aggregation, solar power, energy efficient buildings), water quality data analysis, contaminated site vulnerability to climate change, and lead poisoning prevention (for federal, state, and city agencies and various nonprofits).
This semester students are creating a database of municipal ordinances limiting the use of gas-powered leaf blowers, reviewing a state contract for pest management to ensure it fosters reductions in pesticide use, providing maps and data on chemical storage and contaminated sites for watershed associations, considering policies to resist “ecogentrification”, and performing legislative support for a bill in the Massachusetts legislature to make it easier for victims of lead poisoning to sue those who caused the lead to be in products that they knew would have a high likelihood of harming people (such suits have been hindered by the requirement that plaintiffs establish a specific chain of causation from a particular manufacturer to a particular victim). These students are learning at a very fast pace, because they have clients for whom they wish to produce quality work, and they have work that they believe in. Although the students are often dismayed to learn about the problems and the irresponsibility that caused them, and the inadequacy of institutional response, they are rewarded with a sense that their work is of value. I have had several dozen students in the class thus far and the number who did not attack their work with dedication and a fine attention to quality has been very few. Almost all of them have had the chance to present their work to public officials or in professional settings, including conferences, which not only provides them with career-building experience but also gives them something to point to on their resume.
Most importantly, in my view, is that the students get to dive deeply into environmental and public health issues that affect us all, and see that justice and responsibility are not abstract or peripheral. They are central to our lives and our relationships, and addressing them is not what we should do just when we have the time, or only as a matter of personal choice. These are essential matters of universal concern and when students work on them they see that, and they learn firsthand that addressing them is not only possible but practical and valuable. After sharing the EDF blog with Josh Taylor, a student who took a leading position on the lead pipe study, he wrote back, noting that EDF
predicted that the “costs to agencies, homeowners, and building owners could be reduced significantly if removal were coordinated with other street construction/excavation”. This was the exact conclusion of our report! It's awesome to see that we were in the right ball park for recommendations!
The sense of satisfaction in learning how to solve important problems is one of the great rewards of a practical education. As the country is now engaged in a discussion of whether it makes sense to invest in a “Green New Deal”, this is a key recognition to foster. The students become carriers of the message that doing the right thing is smart, and they learn a lot about how to do it. This education benefits everyone.
The class “Research for Environmental Agencies and Organizations” grew out of my pro-bono supervision of independent work by students interested in tackling real problems, and has included such topics as toxics in hair products, transforming environmental justice neighborhoods into green communities, clean energy (electric vehicle charging, community choice aggregation, solar power, energy efficient buildings), water quality data analysis, contaminated site vulnerability to climate change, and lead poisoning prevention (for federal, state, and city agencies and various nonprofits).
This semester students are creating a database of municipal ordinances limiting the use of gas-powered leaf blowers, reviewing a state contract for pest management to ensure it fosters reductions in pesticide use, providing maps and data on chemical storage and contaminated sites for watershed associations, considering policies to resist “ecogentrification”, and performing legislative support for a bill in the Massachusetts legislature to make it easier for victims of lead poisoning to sue those who caused the lead to be in products that they knew would have a high likelihood of harming people (such suits have been hindered by the requirement that plaintiffs establish a specific chain of causation from a particular manufacturer to a particular victim). These students are learning at a very fast pace, because they have clients for whom they wish to produce quality work, and they have work that they believe in. Although the students are often dismayed to learn about the problems and the irresponsibility that caused them, and the inadequacy of institutional response, they are rewarded with a sense that their work is of value. I have had several dozen students in the class thus far and the number who did not attack their work with dedication and a fine attention to quality has been very few. Almost all of them have had the chance to present their work to public officials or in professional settings, including conferences, which not only provides them with career-building experience but also gives them something to point to on their resume.
Most importantly, in my view, is that the students get to dive deeply into environmental and public health issues that affect us all, and see that justice and responsibility are not abstract or peripheral. They are central to our lives and our relationships, and addressing them is not what we should do just when we have the time, or only as a matter of personal choice. These are essential matters of universal concern and when students work on them they see that, and they learn firsthand that addressing them is not only possible but practical and valuable. After sharing the EDF blog with Josh Taylor, a student who took a leading position on the lead pipe study, he wrote back, noting that EDF
predicted that the “costs to agencies, homeowners, and building owners could be reduced significantly if removal were coordinated with other street construction/excavation”. This was the exact conclusion of our report! It's awesome to see that we were in the right ball park for recommendations!
The sense of satisfaction in learning how to solve important problems is one of the great rewards of a practical education. As the country is now engaged in a discussion of whether it makes sense to invest in a “Green New Deal”, this is a key recognition to foster. The students become carriers of the message that doing the right thing is smart, and they learn a lot about how to do it. This education benefits everyone.
ACTIVITY
For your Classroom, your Community Group, or you, the Environmental Citizen.
For your Classroom, your Community Group, or you, the Environmental Citizen.
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Consider the purpose of the section of your course (such as: natural cycles, biodiversity, water or air pollution, hazardous waste law) and ask the students what they would like to see happen. Would they like to see action taken to reduce the loss of topsoil, the preservation of species, the protection of water or air, reductions in hazardous waste? After listing the responses, ask the students to group themselves by choosing a topic to work on. Then assign them the task of determining the relevant authorities who could take action to foster the progress they would like to see, and of developing recommendations for those authorities to consider. (This should include noting whether the authority has created opportunities to receive comments). This is the first phase of the project, and it can be made explicit after they have completed it that this is preparation for what they can do the rest of their lives – for being engaged citizens. Ask them how things will change if people who are knowledgeable, as they are, don’t make their opinions known to the authorities. The second phase can be to develop strategies for action. This can be a campaign to prompt others to make recommendations to engage with government, and/or each other, and/or with media, and/or to form organizations or to simply take direct action to address the problem. Phase one, engage with government. Phase two, engage with everyone and anyone, starting with yourself. Of course, the order of these phases can be reversed. The important thing is not to just teach content, but to try to help students develop the taste for a life of meaningful commitment. |
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