Make Your Dorm Room Green!

With about 7 weeks left in summer (but who's counting) the urge to start planning  for the major move from home to dorm is upon us...well at least me. Entering my junior year I decided to take a look at ways college students could help the environment by making their dorm rooms just a tad bit greener. I found a great list of ideas online that helped jump start research into living greener at school.

You live, eat, sleep, study, and breath in your room at college. Your bed turns into a multi-purpose surface and there's no better way to help the environment then to drape your bed organic fabrics. Try finding organic cotton or even bamboo sheets. Bed, Bath, and Beyond (The go to head quarters for college gear) has a selection of bamboo sheets to try. 

For those of us privileged to be attending a school that provides private bathrooms for each room, you may want to try out some PEVA (found at IKEA) shower curtains. PEVA shower curtains are affordable alternatives to shower curtains made with PVC vinyl, which not only contains hormone-disrupting phthalates but is also the most environmentally damaging plastic, releasing carcinogenic dioxin into the atmosphere during production. PEVA contains no chlorine (the source of dioxin) or phthalates.  If you are stuck in a dorm that uses public bathrooms, don't forget your shower shoes! Look for shoes that are made from EVA, an alternative from rubber and PVC.

When moving in, the walls and furniture of your dorm room are a blank canvas, so get creative! Be crafty and look around your house for ideas. An old flower pot with a new paint job makes a great pen/pencil holder. Same holds true for old frames. Don't forget to bring along those pictures of friends from home and family. Not only will these photos liven up your room but they make for a great conversation starter with new friends at school. 

Laptop, cell phone, TV, DVD player, video game devices, the list of electronics is endless. These things are necessities in today's world, but using unnecessary amounts of energy is not. Use a power strip to plug all your electronics into. Your Resident Assistant will love you for having them and it can easily be switched off when you're not using the devices. Just make sure your fridge is not plugged into the power cord, turning that off will cause a disaster.

When you are not "enjoying" the food at your dinning hall, reach for a nice cool " beverage" in your MicroFridge (www.microfridge.com). This Energy-Star-rated three-in-one refrigerator/freezer/microwave will not only saves energy but also resources and less packaging than if you bought them separately. And stock the fridge will all you can eat organic foods such as fruit and veggies for those long nights of cramming...I mean studying.

Goodbye are the days of worksheets for homework and coloring in the lines, welcome to the world of papers. The number of papers any individual college student writes is unpredictable but there's no need to waste trees when printing all these papers off. Look for recycled printer paper (Office Max offers a great selection) to load your printer with. Try setting your printing options to draft, this uses less ink with no visible difference is the overall appearance of the paper. You can also recommend to your professor a way to send your papers electronically through email or uploading them to a class website. This eliminates paper all together.

Hopefully all you college bound students find something on this list to help make your dorm room a little greener. Also once at school try setting up a recycling program or design a club for other environmentally concerned students to get together and help out around campus. Every little bit counts!