ASUN – Page 12 – Insight Magazine

How to be Environmentally Friendly This Summer

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We get it, we get it. Being a full time student and an environmentally friendly citizen can be time consuming and difficult. You don’t always think about recycling or how much waste you’re producing when you’re running late to class or work. Fear not. Here are some tips and tricks that you can implement into your lifestyle this summer that not only will help keep our planet green but will help you save some money, too.

Participate in the Keep Tahoe Red, White & Blue beach cleanup after Independence Day on July 5^th. Lake Tahoe gets heavy visitation during summer holidays. Despite the beach being the perfect place to enjoy the season with friends, many visitors don’t pick up after themselves. Last summer volunteers removed 1,676 pounds of trash from Tahoe beaches the day after the Fourth of July, according to The League to Save Lake Tahoe. Plastic and cigarette butts not only look disgusting when left everywhere, but it has damaging effects on local wildlife and lake clarity. The League to Save Lake Tahoe provides reusable cleanup bags, gloves and hand sanitizer, refreshments, giveaways, and free raffle prizes for those who volunteer to clean up. Cleanup sites include Commons Beach, Kings Beach, Kiva Beach, Nevada Beach, and Regan Beach. If you’re unable to attend, you can also make a donation on their website.
Save Water during day-to-day use. According to the City of Reno’s Sustainability Department, if you shorten your shower by just a minute that can be the equivalent of saving 150 gallons of water per month. This not only saves water, but it’ll save you some extra money on your water bill, too. Try to break your habit of turning off the water while you brush your teeth. An average of four gallons is used every minute that your sink is running.
Save Energy by using power strips instead of outlets, and turn off the power strips when you’re not using them to conserve energy. Instead of using your dishwasher’s drying cycle, let your dishes air-dry. This can cut energy by up to 50%. Another great tip is to use wool or rubber dryer balls to separate your clothes. This allows more air to get to your clothes while drying which also saves you energy and money.
Recycle Properly by knowing what you should and shouldn’t throw away. I know I’ve made this mistake myself. I think just because something is paper or plastic it can be easily recycled. Boy was I wrong. Many items of trash I thought would be great for recycling like cardboard pizza boxes, juice boxes, and milk cartons are actually quite difficult to recycle due to grease contamination, being hard to separate, and being a certain type of plastic. I also realized that recycling shredded paper versus non shredded paper makes a difference as well. The more paper is shredded, the more it reduces the grade of the paper, and thus its quality and value. Not even all recyclers take mixed grade paper such as the paper you find in magazines or telephone books. In this case, composting paper after it’s been reduced to confetti size may be a better option if you don’t want to waste it. For a full list of what you can and can’t recycle check out Waste Management’s list of metals, paper, glass, plastics, and more that won’t be wasted if you try to recycle it.

June 19, 2018

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Nic’s Picks: Summer Reading Recommendations

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Young Jane Young – Book by Gabrielle Zevin

A Monica Lewinsky-style scandal rocks the Jewish community in Boca Raton, Florida when an intern named Aviva Grossman strikes up a relationship with the district’s congressman. Due to all of the gossip and slut shaming she faces when the scandal is exposed, Aviva cuts all contact with her family, legally changes her name to Jane Young and moves to Maine. Fast forward a decade, and Jane is now a wedding planner with a daughter, Ruby. Jane’s secret is hidden from Ruby as she tries to raise her daughter to be strong and stand up for herself from bullies.

The perspective of the novel shifts through 4 characters: Jane’s mother, Jane, Ruby and the congresswoman’s wife. The engaging story focuses on feminism and also deals with sex scandals and serious consequences in a realistic way, and it sheds light on how slut shaming and body image can affect college-aged women’s choices.

Everything You Want Me to Be – Book by Mindy Mejia

Fans of Shakespeare will enjoy this novel’s parallels to Macbeth. A high school senior and brilliant actress is found murdered and during the investigation, a dangerous and steamy affair is exposed between the victim and her married English teacher. The perspective switches between one of the detectives on the case, Hattie, the student and Peter, the teacher. As the police and Hattie’s family uncover her double life after she is gone, it is important that we also hear from her side of things. Her character is manipulative and she often refers to her many “roles”: the good student, the good daughter and the good girlfriend. Hattie’s dream of becoming an actress on Broadway reveals how she is determined to get what she wants, how obsessive she is over her teacher and failing to see how she ruins his life makes her a fitting Lady Macbeth for the school play.

While there are two suspects for the murder, the novel gives clues that everything isn’t always reliant on evidence and testing. Readers may also find Hattie’s strong willed personality and ruthless actions unrealistic and downright disturbing as she ruins Peter’s marriage and mental health. Overall, the novel is a juicy read and shows how love and lust play their roles in serious relationships.

Home Sweet Home – Novel by April Smith

A novel set during the time of America’s witch hunt for Communists, a young family aspiring to become politicians gets swept up in decade-old accusations in a small South Dakota town. New York city-slickers Calvin and Betsy Kusek move to the Midwest after they first meet. Calvin is a lawyer and Betsy is a former member of the Young Communist League and a traveling nurse.

Calvin has aspirations to run for the Senate as a Democrat in a sea of Republicans, and his opponent is a greedy, ruthless man. The story’s smear campaign is pretty tame compared to the 2016 Presidential election, but readers will appreciate the story’s fair handling of a trial. The novel also has a lot of characters in the town that the couple interact with and it can be hard to keep track of everyone, and a brand new, totally unrelated character comes in about 20 pages before the novel’s end makes this a long and often tricky read.

Difficult Women – Novel by Roxane Gay

This Audie Award nominated collection of short stories is centered around female characters, ranging from realistic fiction to sci-fi genres. The topics covered in the stories are serious and range from LGBT relationships to divorce, fat shaming, and racism. Gay is great at crafting complex characters in such a small amount of time, and each comes with a diverse point of view. The stories often deal with dark and sexual themes, and many of the protagonists come with awful life situations, such as a couple whose toddler was crushed to death by a car in a parking lot. The collection has a good variety of story lengths, and the opener is one of the longest as it deals with close sisters moving to Reno after being tortured and kidnapped in their teenage years.

June 7, 2018

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Eddy House Launches New Initiative Through Community Birthday Party

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The Eddy House, a local nonprofit that seeks to assist homeless youth in Reno, is hosting a Community Birthday Party on Thursday May 31st, from 3-7 PM at their downtown location. Michele Gehr, the Executive Director of Eddy House, said, “We’re inviting the entire community to come and celebrate one of our boys that passed away last year.” According to Gehr, the young man, named Devonte, would have turned twenty-four this month. During the event, Eddy House will launch a new initiative called “Devonte’s Gift.”

According to Gehr, Devonte regularly went to the Eddy House and helped contribute to the overall morale of the facility. “Devonte was a kid that was always just really charismatic and just had lots of personality. Just very real,” said Gehr, “He had a very tough life, but he was extremely resilient. He was the kid that I thought was going to come out of this.” Gehr said that Devonte had enrolled in classes at Truckee Meadows Community College and hoped to work in early childhood development. “He was really working on pulling his life together, and then he got sick,” said Gehr, “He died of a bacterial infection that killed his heart, and everybody took it really hard here.”

Gehr said that Devonte was extremely committed to Eddy House. “When he was dying, his hospice nurse wheeled him here, and the kids went out and carried him up the steps in his chair,” said Gehr, “That says a lot about his level of commitment to the Eddy House and our family unit here that he would come as he was dying, just to kind of say goodbye.”

“He’s very much missed,” said Gehr, “The kids, and I, and staff wanted a way to honor him, and so we decided on a community birthday party.” Gehr said, “Devonte’s Gift will be a way for the community to help support the Eddy House as we expand.” Gehr hopes to expand the Eddy House and its hours of operation. “The goal is a twenty-four hour center with fifty beds. I want to get these kids off the streets,” said Gehr, “We’re hoping that we get enough community support. This is a community problem to solve, and so if the community comes together, they’ll all have a stake in that.”

According to Gehr, Devonte’s Gift could help Eddy House to achieve the funding required to open a twenty-four hour facility for homeless youth in Reno. Gehr said, “What we’re trying to do is get a thousand individuals, business, organizations, faith-based groups, friend groups, grandparents, whatever it is, just a thousand to commit to a thousand dollars over the course of a year. So that’s about eighty six dollars a month if they go through Paypal.”

“This is a safe place,” said Gehr, “Most of our kids are trauma affected, and many of them, if not all of them, suffer from some form of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). So you have to calm the fight or flight before you can take in extraneous information.” Mental health resources are among the most utilized resources at Eddy House. Gehr said, “I have an MFT (Marriage and Family Therapist) that sees 120 clients a month.”

Gehr said that first, the Eddy House focuses on basic survival needs for the homeless youth, and then on life skills, such as job searching. “Homeless kids really want to work. They view this as a temporary situation, a bump in the road.” said Gehr, “They want to be working, they want to get back in school, they want to get their education, whether that’s in trade, or with a vocational certificate, or their degree. I have kids here that want to be everything from marine biologists to social workers.”

Gehr believes that homelessness in Nevada is preventable and that the community can help to end youth homelessness altogether. “The data shows that if you can intervene before the age of twenty-five, they don’t become homeless again,” said Gehr, “You can effectively stop that cycle, and so we are all about prevention.”

Gehr urges the community to become more involved and to spread the word about Eddy House. “I really want to invite the community to come for a tour. I want them to see what we do, and just know that these kids have so much potential,” said Gehr ,“One of the things we track is ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ And they just want to be normal.— teachers and doctors. They want to own their own business, and they’re really motivated.”

May 31, 2018

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The Gap Year

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As May has quickly come and gone you may be feeling pressure to land your dream job the moment after graduation. But what if you have no clue what, where, or how you’ll be getting any job related to your major? What if you’re not sure about your choice of major at all? You hit the panic button as you reevaluate the ten year plan you’ve laid out for yourself. Don’t be scared because there’s a little something called the gap year that’s here to save you.

What exactly is a gap year, and what does it mean for you?

A gap year is one academic year in which the student, you, steps away from your career to travel the globe, figure out what you want out of life, and what career path you actually want to take, rather than just panicking after college graduation.

No, a gap year after college is not a symptom of being a lazy, unmotivated, or unsuccessful student after graduation. Don’t worry if you haven’t planned your whole life out by the age of twenty-two. The gap year is a time for you to reflect on what you want out of this world while also gaining many personal and career benefits. It’s a time in your life to take a breath and enjoy it before you may become a working slave in the corporate world.

Believe it or not, taking a break from work may actually increase your workplace performance amongst your return. Throughout your gap year, you’ll develop greater career ambitions and goals for yourself.

When you eventually do return, you won’t take your first real job for granted. It won’t be something that’s just landed in your lap, because you’ve already taken the time to explore your options and find what best suits you. You took the time to work for this job and prove your worth. You will have greater work ethic than your coworkers.

Maybe during your time trekking around the world you had to wait tables or wash dishes to make ends meet. Perfect. It’s another life skill you’ve added to your resume. There’s no shame in this. Everyone in their life should experience having at least one or two of these gigs before landing the job of their dreams. It teaches you how to work hard, like work your ass off hard. Yet, you may also find that along the way you gained a sense of appreciation towards people who always have jobs like this. You’ll no longer take the custodian or barista for granted because you’ve learned what it takes to work hard.

Amongst your return, you’ll feel more motivated to jump back into things because you’re not feeling burnt out. It can be rather difficult to pound the pavement right after you’ve spent the last four years studying hard in college. But with a slight mental break, you’ll feel fresh and rested enough to put all of your energy into your new career.

A gap year is also a great resume builder in many ways. During your time off you may learn a new language, a new skill set, or experience a new culture that will change your perspective on the world. You’ll be more adaptable to new situations than someone who hasn’t taken a gap year because you’ve experienced a different culture than that of your own. Living amongst a different society will give you different perspective on things, which will make you a valuable commodity. Your experiences of traveling abroad will give you unique ideas about people and places around the world.

In addition to the numerous perks a gap year will add to your future career, time off will provide you with many personal benefits as well.

If you’re not that college graduate who has your whole future planned out, then that’s ok. This is your time to figure out which path you want to take personally in life and with your career. Or this can be the time for you to reflect on, and confirm your decision of your academic major and future career plans. It’s that extra bit of reassurance that will destroy any doubt in your mind that you had before graduation.

Being young, healthy, and adventurous is also a great time to give back to the world through volunteer work. You’ll be making a huge impact on the local communities you serve by working on many projects that matter to them. Many volunteer programs offer housing to live abroad and volunteer for an extended amount of time. This will be an experience you can always look back and reflect on. Again, it’s something that will give you insight and a greater perspective on the world. Taking time to volunteer abroad will humble you and will make you an all around improved human being. Plus, it’s always better to volunteer now before you’re tied down by a mortgage payment, future children, or your career.

Speaking of kids and careers, this is your time to find out what you want out of life. Time alone by yourself in a different country allows for much self-discovery. Without anyone or anything there to influence you, your mind will have a lot of free time to contemplate what will make you happy in the future. Those who rush into a demanding career right after graduation but are still confused about what they want life often run into problems like an identity crises later in life. You’ll never get this time of reflection in your life back once the ball gets rolling. Take advantage of it while you can.

Sometimes when rushing from one phase of life to the next it can be easy to lose track of what’s truly important. Taking a gap year allows you to learn about what’s really important in the world at a very early age which sets you up for success. Being a twenty-two year old college graduate and knowing about pressing global issues rather than being upset about losing a round of beer pong or having a crappy blind date is colossal. It puts a good perspective on the whole scheme of things.

As we all know, life moves pretty fast. Yesterday it seemed like you were just starting your freshman year, and today you’ve graduated. You need this time to slow the clock down, and soak in the beauty of life. Trust me, you won’t look back at this time in your life when you’re eighty years old, sitting in a nursing home, unable to travel and think, “Man I sure regret exploring the world when I was young.”

As scary and daunting as taking a whole year off may seem, it will teach you so much about yourself and the world. Not having your shit together may be a gift in retrospect because after it’s all said and done, you’ll be confident in who you are as a person and what you want your life to be.

May 23, 2018

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Netflix Review: Little Evil

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Little Evil is a horror-comedy film on Netflix that depicts Gary, played by Adam Scott, as a man who recently married the woman of his dreams. He soon realizes his new stepson is not just a brat, but may also be the literal antichrist. So, of course, he joins a stepdad support group. Gary is the straight man throughout the bizarre, sometimes scary, often hilarious film, while Bridget Everett is delightfully chill as his new best friend, and fellow stepdad, Al.

A highpoint of my viewing experience, and of my life to date, was seeing the importance and utility of monster trucks in an apocalyptic scenario. Well, at any rate, it was highly entertaining. This movie has cults, flaming clowns, the antichrist and Adam Scott. Not watching it is arguably a character flaw.

May 21, 2018

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