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2011 Recipients
Marsha Cooke, Engineering student
Marsha is responsible for arranging group clean-ups for parks and places around campus. Environmental challenges every month through the UES and other clubs she is involved with and just making people aware of issues in general and challenging them on their part towards these challenges. She also does her best to help the reduce her carbon footprint by having her own garden to grow food for herself and others, and composting and offering to take people's compost for them. She has motivated others, myself included, to do our parts towards helping the environment by showing us that it is possible and trying to convince or remind us that we should try living our lives as sustainably as possible. Her actions have resulted in a better environment for people all over campus, the community and the city as a whole. People are more aware of the issues, it gets people talking and interested in things that they might not have known otherwise
Yoan Kagoma, Nathan Stall, and Jen Bondy, Schulich students
Operation Green
As the founders of Operation Green, Jen, Yoan and Nathan have spearheaded an initiative to recycle surgical supplies and donate them to developing nations. In any surgical procedure, many items are prepared for instant access if required by the surgeon, but not used during the procedure. Operation Green collects these items and ships them to developing countries. The implications of Operation Green's work is twofold. Firstly, it contributes to easing the enormous environmental burden caused by surgical overages. It also serves to provide surgical equipment to populations that desperately require it. Thanks to their work, the first shipment of recycled supplies was sent off recently. It weighed in at over 500 pounds, and was valued at almost $15,000. Those two values, representing the amount of waste prevented and the value of goods provided to developing countries really underscores the value of their efforts. In class, their fellow students often joke that Operation Green's motto should be 'Saving the World: One Green Towel at a Time'. While this comment is in jest, it serves to emphasize the scope of their undertaking. Operation Green is the first such project in Canada, and is very reasonable to visualize a time when all Canadian hospitals collect and recycle their surgical waste, largely due to Jen, Yoan and Nathan's efforts.