I am just as guilty as the rest of you; I was not fully aware of all the negative implications of the Bill C-38 which was passed by the Canadian government. I am particularly worried about the changes to food our food safety laws; not only is it harder to trust most products on the shelf, but it is also harder to trust the people who make decisions regarding our safety. One major change was the Health Minister’s appointed power to grant exemptions to food safety requirements without the Parliament’s oversight, nor the need to publish those exemptions. Why should any one person or group EVER be allowed to grant ANY kind of exemption to our food safety without the requirement to publish them? Previously, any exemption made to food laws did not take effect until it was published in the Parliament’s newspaper, the Canada Gazette (remember the GMO’s being allowed into certain foods thing?). This allowed media and Canadians to be aware of changes, to express their opinions, and requ...

Bottled Water haunts me. In spite of not drinking them, I see them littering the streets or thrown in the garbage all over uOttawa even though recycling stations are becoming a dominant feature in our campus landscape.  We offer students free reusable water bottles hoping they will make the switch [they’re available at the SFUO Sustainability Centre ], we have the Freestore which offers up an assortment of options from stainless steel water bottles, to leftovers from the 101 week kits, to plastic and glass cups you could store in your bag and use during class lectures, and there are even Brita pitchers at the Freestore that you could take home with you to eliminate your consumption at home. Upon entering filterforgood.ca, one is bombarded with messages about how you can reduce your environmental impact by purchasing one filter that can replace 300 water bottles.  I personally trust in Ottawa’s public water systems because of the surplus of research I have com...

Chaque fois qu’il y a un déménagement sur le campus; que ce soit permanent ou non, les occupants laissent une quantité inimaginable de choses encore en parfait état à être tout simplement jeté…souvent ils vont se racheter ces mêmes articles en neuf pour leur nouvel espace. La majorité du temps nous parlons de livres, des piles et des piles de papier à recycler, pots de fleurs, cahiers vierges, stylos, gugus organisateurs de bureaux, cadrans, vêtements, etc. C’est terrible; soit les occupants croient qu’il y aura quelqu’un pour nettoyer après eux, ou ils croient que ça ne vaut pas la peine de recycler leurs articles. Peu importe l’intention, je crois que nous sommes tous assez vieux (mature) pour laisser son bureau propre lorsqu’on déménage! Peut-être il devrait y avoir un système de frais pour les employés/profs qui laissent leur bureau malpropre lorsqu’ils quittent – comme en résidence, ou même dans n’importe quel logement loué. Qu’en pensez-vous? Heureusement, nous avons toute...

I wonder if you remember the One Million Acts of Green campaign that was spearheaded by George Strombolopolous a couple of years ago? I thought it was a great idea. Everyone could easily register their act of green and share it with the world. The benefit of doing this of course was that it normalized public commitments to being a more environmentally friendly citizen. Well OMAG (that's the abbreviation just in case you were wondering), is still running strong. It is no longer just associated with the CBC and CISCO Systems; it has grown its own wings and taken flight. The group has been looking to find ways to branch off into new territory and one of the things that they dreamt up is to create a more personalized and interactive app for Facebook. This makes a lot of sense since the whole idea of the OMAG is to share your experiences in the hopes that it will inspire others to do the same. So to that end, the group has partnered up with universities to start creating c...