Maheen+A

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-Maheen





September 27th, 2013

**Imagine you are an environmental activist. What is an environmental issue that concerns you? Why does it matter to you? What can be done about it**?

If I were to be an environmental activist, I don't know what issue would concern me most. I am concerned about a number of things, such as deforestation of habitats and animal testing, though right now I think I'm most concerned about pollution- water pollution, to be specific. In my daily life, I rarely hear of the challenges faced by sea creatures. I hear things in the news regarding air pollution, which is definitely of great concern, but there is relatively little coverage on water pollution. There are so many people who are completely ignorant of this type of pollution, or know very little, and I would like to change that, especially because ours oceans are an uncharted territory. We haven't mapped the ocean floor and there may be thousands of creatures living in the ocean that we haven't even discovered yet! There may even be a whole ecosystem, a community of living things, that have been living their lives without even seeing a human being in their whole existence. Unfortunately, these creatures may not be seeing us, but are definitely feeling the effects of our negligence. Ocean waste can be caused a number of things: improper treatment of plastic garbage, leaching of fertilizers, oil spills, and more - all of it being caused by humans. Sea creatures living in the oceans can be killed by toxins that seep into the water or plastic rings from milk cartons that end up in the ocean. And for those who don't "care" about animals, ocean pollution is affecting humans too. Oceans are an important source of water, which is one of the integral parts of human life. The average Canadian uses 329 litres of water every day. We need water in our daily lives, whether it's to drink, for cleaning, or even to run your electricity. I think being more conscious about the issue of water pollution and being more careful about buying and disposing products can be one thing that can help with this issue. I also think that learning more about what my own community does to help with this issue would be beneficial.

Journal Entry #1 - Secondary Research

Journal #2 - Primary Research
 * x || __**Attitudes**__ || __**Skills**__ || __**Knowledge**__ ||
 * __**Issues**__ || Initially, I had been very interested in my own water use, but I decided not to do anything about it. I was fairly apathetic when it came to making a change. I decided to do my STEPWISE project with Sal on the topic of water footprints because it is something that can relate to everyone because everyone uses water in their daily lives, whether it is directly or indirectly. || In terms of skills, I would like to learn more about this issue through researching and taking action. I would like to gain a better understanding of the way others look at this issue. || I think people are having issues with keeping track of their water footprint and changing their lifestyles to better the environment. ||
 * __**Research**__ || I have researched water footprints and carbon footprints and it seems that, though people know a lot about carbon footprints, water footprints are not nearly as well-known. I've found an abundance of research on the topic of water use and water footprints and am looking forward to using the research I get. || I have used mostly the Internet for research on this topic and haven't found as much information on the topic in books or other resources. I have seen a few YouTube videos about water use and water footprints and have collected the information I need from them. || There is a little bit of bias in the information I receive because at times new sources try to make it seem as if there is more harm being done to the environment than there really is. ||
 * __**Actions**__ || My attitude toward making a change has increased as the project progressed. I want to make a difference in the lives of others and help to spread knowledge to people about their impact on water and their usage of water. It is important for me, as a young person who cares about the environment, to take a stand because younger generations will be the next leaders of our world. Overall, I think taking an action regarding spreading awareness about water footprints is a positive step toward change in our environment. || For my action, I am targeting teenagers, as they are the ones who are the most ignorant about water footprints. I would like to do a survey about water footprints and have it reach the teenage audience the most out of all the age groups. I would also like to target both genders and conduct primary research in the form of a Google Form questionnaire. ||= I would like to learn about other actions that other have taken. ||


 * x || __**Attitudes**__ || __**Skills**__ || __**Knowledge**__ ||
 * __**Issues**__ ||  ||   ||   ||
 * __**Research**__ ||  ||   ||   ||
 * __**Actions**__ ||  ||   ||=   ||

Journal Entry #3 - Action


 * x || __**Attitudes**__ || __**Skills**__ || __**Knowledge**__ ||
 * __**Issues**__ || I've been trying to come up with a solution, which was to advocate water footprint calculating over media sources (Facebook, Twitter) within the past few weeks. After the project came out to be a huge success, I've learned that it isn't that difficult to spread awareness of an issue, as long as you keep trying. We've reached over 100 Twitter followers and over 60 likes and my attitude has been happier than even with the results of our action. || I think the issue of water use is the most important. More people identify with the terms, "water use" than do with "water footprint". It is for this reason that I would like to spread awareness about water footprints by using the phrase, "calculate your water usage". In this way, I can advocate for a better world through using terms that people understand in order to tell them about something that they may not understand. || I am quite knowledgeable about my issue so far and have accessed a number of resources throughout the weeks. ||
 * __**Research**__ || The research portion has finished, but I believe that there is still research to be done. I need to be doing something with the results of my questionnaire, which is what i'm working on doing right now. || I think my researching skills assisted me in this project greatly. By being able to look through many sources of information and utilize computers and books so well, I was able to do the optimal action with the amount of knowledge I needed. I will continue to research this topic, the topic of water footprints and water use, for my own reference. || In our research and questionnaire, there may have been slight bias as we only had certain options and we did not specify what the numbers really represented in some cases (scale questions). We tried to keep the questionnaire concise and easy to use, as well as take information that is directly necessary to us. ||
 * __**Actions**__ || As mentioned earlier, our action has produced some great results and I am very happy with them. I believe that taking action may take a lot of work, since you must create an account and maintain it, but it is worth the effort to see so many people knowledgeable about their water use. || As for my skills in my action, I have been taking many steps toward positive change. The Twitter feed that Sal and I are running has been directed to people who know about the environment and is interested in it, though now we are trying to get it to reach those to may not know so much about it. We have been following people regularly, which has resulted in the 100+ follows we have gotten. Another strategy we used to advocate is retweeting. We retweeted and favourited many people so that those people would be able to see our own tweets. ||= Through becoming more knowledgeable about our action, we have discovered that Twitter is a much better tool than Facebook. With Facebook, we were really only able to target my friends and Sal's friends, as our page wasn't interesting enough for people to like or share. I think we will be working on a new way to gain popularity for our Facebook page, maybe by holding a giveaway to get people to share our page with friends. ||