Hello! My name is Sheryl and I am a second-year chemistry major.  I am in this course because I have not volunteered in many events since I started college, and this course would allow me to start volunteering again, especially in a field that I have not participated in before. This course has been more educative on the environment than I first thought it would be. I got to read some books that gave interesting insights on climate change.  I learned about superfunds by reading Kathryn Glass’s Savage. Also discussing with my classmates their perspectives on what the authors are saying is fun. These conversations can be carried on in our future conversations with people outside of this class, even if our professions might differ. 

I am especially looking forward to volunteering with GNPS. It is exciting to look at the variety of opportunities that the organization has to offer for volunteers. While I have only had one meeting to introduce myself, I learned a lot from that meeting about GNPS. Their goal is to bring back the native plant life of Georgia, by removing invasive species, planting native plants, and also educating people on the different categories of plant life that exist. While we have not begun volunteering yet, the survey responses from GNPS already provided ideas on what my classmate and I can do for our project. One of these is updating the organization’s website with information on native plant life. I find this to be a worthwhile project to undertake as it is always fun to help teach people something new but this will also help me learn about native plant life. Sidenote, but I also have a backyard that I have been wanting to add plants to to make it lively. I hope that volunteering with this organization will help me learn about plant choices I should make when looking for seeds. For example, something that I learned in my first meeting with GNPS was that many stores do not sell native plants. Sometimes people working at those places do not know what native plants Georgia has. I hope to be able to educate myself about what to look for when looking for plants for my backyard.

Looking forward to the rest of this semester!