Dean Cycon, founder and CEO of Dean’s Beans Organic Coffee Company, will be the featured speaker at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts’ (MCLA) “Green Living” series seminar on Thursday, March 6, at 5:30 p.m. in Murdock Hall room 218.  Cycon’s lecture, “Sustainable Business as a Vehicle for Social Change,” part of this spring’s “Cultivating a Sustainable Food System” series, is free and open to the public.

Dean’s Beans Organic Coffee Company is a certified 100% organic, fair trade, and kosher coffee roasting operation in Orange, MA. Cycon created Dean’s Beans to prove that conscientious business can promote economic, social, and environmental change at local and global levels and still be profitable.  For additional information, click here for his company’s website.

Recommended reading on Cycon’s business model and philosophy: 7 Reasons Why Bigger Isn’t Always Better for Your Startup. Paula Andruss, Entrepreneur.com, 1/31/2014.

The series will continue on Thursdays through April 24. For more information, go to http://www.mcla.edu/greenliving or contact Dr. Elena Traister, (413) 662-5303.

The 2014 Green Living Seminar series is a presentation of MCLA’s Berkshire Environmental Resource Center and the MCLA Environmental Studies Department.

Greetings and salutations! Very soon, this blog will be filled with campus greening initiatives and helpful hints for reducing your environmental footprint.  But for today, I leave you with Eagle Cam, a live feed of a nesting bald eagle at Berry College in Georgia.  The link will take you to Berry College’s page with information about these amazing creatures as well as the live feed.  ENJOY!!!

http://www.berry.edu/eaglecam/

UPDATE!  The eagles have hatched!  Here’s a YouTube video of the new eaglet!

BCC COMPOSTS!!!  WOO WOO WOO!!!

In a campus-wide effort to reduce food and other waste, the cafeteria (in partnership with the Green Team and Empire Zero) has started a very exciting composting program!  For the first time, the BCC community can separate recyclables, food waste, and trash with ease.  Now you can compost in any of the following locations:

• Cafeteria near the tray return window
• SBA Annex kitchenette
• Field Administration Building, east lobby, on 1st AND 2nd floors

I’ll be honest: I LOVE COMPOST!  When I was in college, a friend caught me off-guard by asking out of the blue, “What do you want?”  My instant response? “A compost pile.”  Not many 19 year old college students dream of piles of decaying matter, but there you go.  Compost is awesome.

You may be asking yourself, what on earth is composting?  Excellent question!  Composting is the act of reusing biodegradable food, lawn, and paper products to make an organic fertilizer and soil amendment.  These materials are piled up and allowed to decompose; the combination of heat and moisture (and occasional earthworm) creates a perfect environment for bacteria to break down the materials into a lovely addition for your soil.

Now for the important question: why compost?  Food and lawn waste accounts for 20-30% of what Americans throw away.  Composting keeps these materials out of landfills where they take up space and release methane, a greenhouse gas.  In addition to decreasing the sheer amount of waste going into landfills, composting enriches the soil while reducing the need for chemical fertilizers.  All in all, compost is a win-win.

How does our new compost system work?  This handy bilingual graphic can help you determine what should go where.  Many thanks to Empire Zero!

If you have any questions about this new program, please contact the Green Team.  We’re happy to help!

A great resource for starting your own compost pile at home:

http://www2.epa.gov/recycle/composting-home