Shippensburg University is adjusting to sustainability, and so are students as they prepare for the upcoming Earth Day celebration Thursday.

Students for Environmental Action and Sustainability (SEAS) and Shippensburg’s Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) have partnered to launch an Earth Day celebration on April 26 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the academic quad. 

The celebration serves as an effort to engage and educate students about sustainability, how they can contribute and how the campus is evolving around sustainability.

The Earth Day celebration will be hosting about 30 on-campus clubs and around 10 vendors, including the dining halls, watershed house, WSYC and PRSSA. 

There will be about 300 sustainable prizes given away during the celebration including reusable straws, bamboo toothbrushes and a solar panel charger as the grand prize.

Margaret Dunkelberger, president of SEAS, is hoping the celebration will affect about 1,000 students and that they will be more aware of what the organization does. As the newly appointed president, Dunkelberger is thinking about long term effects but is starting small.

“There are other options available if they look for them,” Dunkelberger said. 

She brought to attention that bamboo toothbrushes are pretty cheap and that she declines the plastic lids on her coffee cups as a way to keep plastic out of the landfills.

“At home we buy local beef, pork and chicken, pick up trash and recycling off the ground, and of course, turn off lights. The list could go on but I try to encourage others to do these things, too,” Dunkelberger said.

The Earth Day celebration is just a small step for SEAS. The club wants to eventually work with the dining services in order to help make campus into a more sustainable environment. Dunkelberger is looking to get reusable, washable, straws in all of the dining halls.

Some long-term goals Dunkelberger is hoping to see is a solar car competition and better use and awareness of the recycling and trash on campus. She is hoping to broaden SU’s recycling by both knowledge of recycling and SU’s recycling abilities.

“Earth Day is a day to celebrate the earth and the things that we have. Earth Day is also a learning experience because there’s always more to learn,” she said.

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