Katrina Torelli

ENST 246 - Spring 2025

POINTS TOTAL

0 TODAY
0 THIS WEEK
645 TOTAL

participant impact

UP TO

14

organic meals

consumed
UP TO

22

pounds of CO2

have been saved
UP TO

1,620

minutes

not spent in front of a screen
UP TO

7.0

plastic straws

not sent to the landfill
UP TO

160

gallons of water

have been saved
UP TO

280

minutes

spent exercising
UP TO

2.0

conversations

with people
UP TO

7.0

people

helped
UP TO

810

minutes

spent outdoors
UP TO

55

minutes

spent learning

Katrina's actions

Nature

Practice Gratitude for Earth

I will spend 30 minute(s) per day outside, practicing gratitude (prayer, meditation, journaling, etc.) for Earth and my natural surroundings.

COMPLETED 27
DAILY ACTIONS

Simplicity

Less Screen Time

I will replace 60 minute(s) of screen time each day with other activities.

COMPLETED 27
DAILY ACTIONS

Simplicity

Core Values

We may find more meaning and joy in life when our actions are aligned with our personal values. I will determine what my top 3-5 core values are so that I can better align my actions with them.

COMPLETED
ONE-TIME ACTION

Energy

Power Down the Computer

I will power down my computer and monitor when not using it for more than 2 hours, saving up to (1.1) lbs of CO2 each day that I do this.

COMPLETED 20
DAILY ACTIONS

Energy

Learn About Renewable Energy

I will spend 25 minutes learning more about renewable energy alternatives (i.e. solar, wind, biomass) in my region.

COMPLETED
ONE-TIME ACTION

Water

Brush My Teeth Without Running Water

I will save up to 8 gallons (30 L) of water each day by turning it off while brushing my teeth.

COMPLETED 20
DAILY ACTIONS

Health

Joyful Movement

I will spend 20 minutes doing an activity where I'm both moving my body and enjoying myself.

COMPLETED 14
DAILY ACTIONS

Health

Go get a check up

I will make an appointment for my annual physical.

COMPLETED
ONE-TIME ACTION

Food

Choose Organic Ingredients

I will enjoy 1 meal(s) cooked with organic ingredients each day.

COMPLETED 14
DAILY ACTIONS

Food

Try a New Way to Prep

I will try a new method of food preparation, such as canning, pickling, or baking bread.

COMPLETED
ONE-TIME ACTION

Health

Happiness

I will write down three things every day that I am grateful for, or send one email every day thanking or praising someone.

COMPLETED 14
DAILY ACTIONS

Waste

Skip the Straw

Plastic bags and small plastic pieces like straws are most likely to get swept into our waterways. I will keep 1 plastic straw(s) out of the landfill and ocean each day by refusing straws or using my own glass/metal straw.

COMPLETED 7
DAILY ACTIONS

Community

Help Others

I will offer to help 1 person(s) who are in need each day.

COMPLETED 7
DAILY ACTIONS

Waste

Learn About & Practice Sustainable Fashion

I will learn about sustainable fashion and begin trying to practice it in my own life.

COMPLETED
ONE-TIME ACTION

Community

Engage In Active Listening

I will practice actively listening to a friend, family member, co-worker, acquaintance, or someone who I may disagree with in at least 2 conversations.

COMPLETED
ONE-TIME ACTION

Participant Feed

Reflection, encouragement, and relationship building are all important aspects of getting a new habit to stick.
Share thoughts, encourage others, and reinforce positive new habits on the Feed.

To get started, share “your why.” Why did you join the challenge and choose the actions you did?

Katrina Torelli 2/18/2025 11:22 AM
For my daily challenge in the “waste” category, I chose “skip the straw”. This means that every day I will replace a plastic straw with a metal or reusable straw. This is something that initially was difficult for me because everyday I drink an emergen-c out of a tumbler with a plastic straw. While this daily challenge is not actually a hard thing to do, it was something that I had to incorporate into my routine. I found an old metal straw that I had lying around in my drawer and I have been making an effort to use it everyday. This has taught me that I am much more capable of making little changes in my daily routine than I give myself credit for. For my daily challenge in the “community” category, I chose “help others”. This means that every day I will help one person in need. This is something that I felt was very important for me to incorporate into my daily routine because sometimes I am so busy that I feel myself only focusing on how I can make my time more productive rather than the needs of others. I have learned that now that I have put helping others on my radar, I am much more inclined to look for people who need it. For example, I am more likely to hold the door or the elevator for someone now that I am aware that they may need my help.

Through the daily challenges across all the categories, I have learned that many of the largely advertised “environmentally friendly” practices that we do everyday are largely executed by PR firms. One of the daily challenges that I chose for the “food” week was to “choose organic ingredients” for one meal every day. This is something that I found to be relatively easy when I knew where to look and what food to buy, but after reading Pollan’s article, “Naturally” (2001), I realized that a lot of the “organic food” companies we support are thriving on false claims. Many companies utilize misleading labels and graphics with small farms or beautiful landscapes to guide the consumer to believe they are supporting a “mom and pop” farm when in reality the milk they are buying is loaded with chemicals. Pollan states that many organic farms became “PR firms” for the organic food movement. These companies target health seeking consumers who will buy organic for the perceived health benefits. McGrath’s article, “The Gathering Storm”, focuses on natural cooking and the commoditization of the organic food industry. Through my daily challenge and these articles, I have learned that the things that I thought were truly organic and contributing to the environment in a positive way are mostly based on false advertisements.

Disposability is based on throwaway culture and the rise of one-time use plastic products that contribute to the norms of cleanliness and convenience in society. The daily and one-time challenges in the “food” and “waste” categories are interlinked because they focus on living intentionally with waste disposal, some of that through food, and taking initiative on how to improve the state of the environment through our methods of fueling. These challenges connect to Strasser’s article “Never Gonna Give You Up” (2019) because she connects the idea of convenience and cleanliness to single use plastic products in the United States. Many people use plastic eating utensils so that they don't have to do dishes or drink out of plastic straws to save time. Some of the daily challenges for “food” and “waste” are about practicing “zero waste meals” or “skipping the straw” to reduce the amount of waste that is produced from food consumption. Throwaway culture, as stated by Strasser, rested on the idea that somebody else would carry away the trash, and this is something that the eco challenge holds members accountable for. The “health” and “community” sections of the eco challenge focus on quality of life and helping one’s surrounding community. Kaiser-Schatzlein’s article, “The history of New York, told through trash”, emphasizes how when the Fresh Kill landfill became so harmful to the quality of life of Staten Island residents they began to lobby for the closing. This connects to the health and community categories because people came together to support their community in the name of their collective health.

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- Andrew Stuhl 2/19/2025 12:23 PM
  - TEAM CAPTAIN
  - 28-DAY STREAK
  Nicely done Katrina! I see how you are integrating the readings and your experiences with your daily challenges into your answers to the prompts for this assignment. I'm thankful for your efforts in this Eco Challenge. I truly believe that experiential learning - where we do things ourselves, in addition to just reading about them - is a powerful way to learn a subject, in this case environmental activism. I hope you can take some of the new habits, sense of accountability, and sense of your own ability to make small daily changes into the future - not just our next unit in this course, but beyond this course as well. Like you said in your journal, we are much more capable of making change than we often give ourselves credit for.
  
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Katrina Torelli 2/05/2025 12:31 PM
Over the past 7-8 days, I have greatly enjoyed experimenting with these daily and one-time challenges. The new daily challenges relating to the categories “water” and “energy” that I chose this week were “power down the computer” and “brush my teeth without running water”. While incredibly effective for the environment, these daily challenges are ones that are very applicable to my daily life. I am not in the habit of powering down my computer when I am not using it, and also typically brush my teeth with the sink running the entire time. The first two days that I implemented these new daily challenges, I struggled to remember to do these things and had to make a conscious effort to remember to turn the sink off and power down my laptop. After overcoming that barrier, I have now incorporated these two things into my daily routine. My one-time challenge was to spend 25 minutes learning about renewable energy. While this may not seem difficult, I realized I had never actually taken the time to research this topic on my own. What surprised me the most about these challenges was how something so minute like turning off the sink when brushing your teeth can feel like such a change in routine. I think this shows how deep rooted our environmental habits are.

The main barrier that I would face in making these lifestyle changes permanent is how they were not already integrated into my daily routine. I am the kind of person who always follows the exact same routine, and to learn something new like this was a challenge for me at the beginning. Powering down my computer when I wasn’t using it was something that concerned me at first because sometimes it takes a really long time to turn back on. I knew that these were not hard changes to make in my life, but I had to make a very active effort to remind myself to implement these habits. Once I reminded myself that these small changes could have such a big impact on the environment, I realized how important it was to follow through with them.

Knowing what I know from my personal experience and the “resources” I read the past two weeks, I am willing to make these lifestyle changes permanent. All of my daily challenges so far, spending time outside every day, lowering my screen time, turning the sink off when I brush my teeth, and powering down my computer when I am not using it, are things that are beneficial to not only the environment, but my quality of life as well. While these habits, or challenges, can seem tedious at first and difficult to implement into daily life, they are extremely worth it in the long run. The Healthline article that was assigned last week about the health benefits of being outside proved how not only good for the environment, but beneficial for personal health going outside can be. I especially loved how they stated that going outside can boost immune function, because I feel that when I spend more time outside I get sick less often. Thoreau also stated how simply being outside can free an individual from the stresses of everyday life. After learning about the water shortages in San Francisco and the supply issues that caused the building of Hetch-Hetchy Dam, I realized how important it is to conserve water. By turning off the sink when I am brushing my teeth, I am actively conserving water.

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- Andrew Stuhl 2/06/2025 7:35 AM
  - TEAM CAPTAIN
  - 28-DAY STREAK
  Nice Katrina! It's certainly expected that everyone here in the EcoChallenge has moments / days where we forget or slip up and revert to our old behaviors instead of taking the actions we committed to. That definitely happens, especially when we're making a lot of changes at once. I hope you and all other students can give yourself grace and simply turn the page and recommit to taking that action next time. Our goal is progress, not perfection!
  
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Katrina Torelli 1/27/2025 9:54 AM
Thinking about the EcoChallenge for Unit 2, something that I am the most excited about is being able to track the actual impact I am making with my participation. People always say that they are going to make an effort to aid in the environmental crisis, but being held accountable for that is equally as important. A daily challenge that I am excited about from the “Simplicity” category is “Less Screen Time”. This excites me because I feel that I often spend the majority of my free time on my phone rather than doing something meaningful. I want to hold myself accountable to the fact that I will be replacing an hour a day of screen time with either being outside or reading a book. A daily challenge that I am nervous about is from the “Nature” category which is “Practicing Gratitude for Earth”. This is more challenging for me because in the winter months it can be difficult to spend extra time outside. A one-time challenge that I am excited about is from the “Energy” category which is “Learn About Renewable Energy” . This excites me because I want to learn more about renewable energy and how I can use what I learn to make a real impact. A one-time challenge that I am nervous about from the “Transportation” category is “Stay on the Ground”. This is more challenging for me because I rely on planes when I travel longer distances.

The daily EcoChallenge that I think will have the most impact on my ecological footprint is from the “Happiness” category. The challenge is called “Practice Loving-Kindness Meditation”. I believe this will have a large impact on my ecological footprint because I feel that I need to improve upon practicing mindfulness and compassion. Sometimes I struggle with being kind to myself and I need to hold myself to more realistic personal standards. The one-time EcoChallenge that I think will have the most impact on my ecological footprint is from the “Community” category. The challenge is called “Engage in Active Listening”. I believe this will have a large impact on my ecological footprint because I need to improve upon my listening skills. Sometimes when others share ideas that I strongly disagree with, I have a hard time hearing their side of the story. Improving my listening skills will be a great help to myself and others.

The daily challenge that will challenge the political, social, and economic drivers of the crises we face is from the “Community” category. The challenge is called “Support a Sharing Economy”. I can support a sharing economy by lending what I am not using to other people in order to prevent waste and overconsumption. This will challenge the political, social, and economic drivers of the crises we face because people often don’t think about borrowing from others or sharing their things in order to be environmentally friendly. This can not only increase a sense of community but also prevent economical factors from harming the environment in the form of waste. The one-time challenge that will address this cause is from the “Energy” category called “Choose Clean/Renewable Energy”. This will challenge societal, political, and economical norms because people are most used to using the cheapest or most convenient forms of energy. By challenging ourselves to be environmentally conscious, we can improve our carbon footprint.

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- Andrew Stuhl 1/27/2025 11:48 AM
  - TEAM CAPTAIN
  - 28-DAY STREAK
  Great Katrina! I'm glad you perused the different categories and found all of these interesting, *challenging* new activities for you to experiment with. I'm glad you have identified "less screen time" as a goal of yours that aligns with your interests and also the environmental impacts we are seeking thru this Eco Challenge. I totally hear you on our relationships to phones/screens: it is something we all know we ought to reduce, but it can be so difficult. Those social media companies in particular are so good at hooking our attention! Good for you to think intentionally about how much time you want your phone to have in your life, and to think about ways to replace phone time with something more meaningful. I've been working on the same, so I'm right there with you!
  
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