Plastic Free Zone: A break free from plastics pledge on Geneseo Speaks

On Apr. 18, Plastic Free Zone, a Geneseo student task force, sponsored a petition on Geneseo Speaks to “Support A Break Free From Plastics Pledge.” The petition’s description reads, “We demand SUNY Geneseo begin phasing out non-essential, single-use plastics and replace them with readily available alternatives via a Break Free From Plastics Pledge.” The petition quickly surpassed its original goal of 75 signatures, and had 172 signatures as of Wednesday, Apr. 27.

Freshman biology major Liz Klosko has been the one to spearhead and mostly guide this project to where it is today. Despite her newness to Geneseo’s campus, Klosko has been quick to establish a name for herself in the Geneseo community through her work with the sustainability department.

“Things have been moving slowly but surely,” Klosko said, reflecting on the speed at which this project took hold. “It wasn’t initially the plan when I got here.”

Klosko began the project soon after her arrival at Geneseo, inspired by a course that she took at the beginning of the year as a requirement for living in the Eco House in Monroe Hall. Soon after deciding that reducing single-use plastics on campus was an objective that she wanted to bring to Geneseo, Klosko was contacted by students at Skidmore College who were working on a similar project on their own campus.

Soon after this contact was made, Klosko was connected to Oceana, an organization focused on protecting and restoring oceans on an international scale. Another springboard propelling Klosko into her leadership role for this project, Klosko was offered an internship at Oceana to start doing break-free-from-plastic work on Geneseo’s campus.

This goal for the project has expanded quite a bit since its humble beginnings in Monroe Hall. “Reduce unnecessary single-use plastics on campus—that’s our ultimate goal,” Klosko said. “It’s hopefully to eliminate them, and that’s what we would be doing by a break free from plastics pledge with the president. Even reducing compostable items that we have and replacing them with reusable alternatives.”

The goals of Plastic Free Zone have quickly taken hold in the Geneseo culture since its first pitch to Dan DeZarn, the Director of Sustainability at SUNY Geneseo. Klosko said that DeZarn expressed excitement about the project, explaining that a group of faculty had attempted a similar project in 2016 that was shut down by a combination of a lack of interest from the president and the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Klosko has worked closely with the sustainability department to grow and expand the reach of this project and explained that the project has so far operated as an unofficial subcommittee of the sustainability department. “It is pretty much where everything started for us on campus,” Klosko said.

Klosko noted, however, that the work that the Plastic Free Zone has done has received support from both the sustainability department and Geneseo Knight Life, but remains very independent. “As of right now, we’re associated [with the sustainability department], but we’re pretty hands-off,” Klosko said. “We’re doing a lot of this on our own.”

The unofficial nature of the Plastic Free Zone has made involvement with the organization vaguely inaccessible, an issue that Klosko hopes to correct once the project has more thoroughly found its roots. For now, Klosko is most focused on drafting a resolution for the Student Senate, a focus that she expressed confidence about, and pushing out interest in the petition on Geneseo Speaks. Klosko wants the petition to be a benchmark in sustainability for Geneseo that the entire community can get involved with.

“We have a group of faculty that are interested in what we are doing that we are keeping updated, but we want them to be able to sign a petition-like thing so that President Battles can see that it’s not just students who want this, it’s not just faculty who want this, it’s a broader group within the school,” she said. 

Klosko hopes to introduce more projects that would eliminate single-use plastics, such as take-back trays for the dining halls instead of compostable to-go containers. “[This] would be pretty doable on our campus, too, it’s just a matter of getting students behind it and also getting CAS behind it, but they’ve also been pretty willing to work with us too.”

As the Plastic Free Zone’s foundation is still just beginning to take build, Klosko is finishing out her freshman year with a much different workload than she had had in mind coming into Geneseo. “I have gotten the question many times, ‘When are you going to switch to be a sustainability major?’ And I love it—I love sustainability. I just think that I want to integrate it into being a vet [her previously outlined goal career]. I’m very confident with the track that I’m on right now.”

Klosko also touched on the emotional component that commitment to sustainability, climate change, and plastic consumption can often entail. “Honestly, I’m just concerned that if I were to get into sustainability work it would be too depressing. It’s a lot emotionally, especially when it’s all you’re doing as a career.”

That being said, there are many healthy and supportable ways that Geneseo students can get involved with sustainability and Plastic Free Zone today.

“Right now [getting involved] is a little tough, other than the petition. But we still recruit student volunteers on occasion…coming to our meetings would be the ultimate, ‘Yes! Help us out!’ Other than that, we do have an emailing list that people can get on…[but] signing the petition is probably one of the biggest ways people can help us right now.”

Follow @plasticfree_geneseo on Instagram for more updates on how to help out and any interest events that the task force may hold.