Campus celebrates Earth Day

Fort Worth, TX

4/26/2008

Bean bag chairs, rock music and free lattes, it wasn't a typical Earth Day celebration, but TCU students enjoyed the scene on Sadler Lawn at a fundraiser for endangered Costa Rican parrots.

The Concert for the Macaws, held by Adduco Viridis TCU Environmental Club, raises funds in order to preserve the bird's imperiled native habitat. Local businesses donated environmentally friendly raffle prizes including lunchboxes from Pottery Barn and organic chocolate. The lattees were a product giveaway handed out to passers by and were packaged in recyclable cans.

The club's first Concert for the Macaws raised more than $1,000, helping preserve trees that otherwise would have been cut down for farmland. The concert was held at 8.0 restaurant in downtown Fort Worth. Environmental Club members said having the concert on campus this year made it more accesible to students, faculty and staff.

Students in an "Intro to Texas Politics" class used the event to gather signatures from students to ask the university to place more recycling bins around campus. By 4 p.m., students had gathered more than 150 signatures.

"We're trying to raise awareness of this important issue," said Jon Akins, a freshman business/accounting major. "I don't think people are as aware as they should be. Some think it's a joke."

Melissa Crutchfield, a freshman education major who was gathering signatures at the concert, said her generation of college students see the green movement as a pivital issue for their generation, not just an Earth Day event.

"We have to do something," she said. "We are the future."

by: Kathryn Hopper, The TCU Magazine