This November, many NYU Abu Dhabi community members pledged to reduce their waste by participating in the No Waste November campaign to promote sustainable habits. This year’s campaign was the third of its kind organized at NYUAD by the Student Interest Group Ecoherence. The initiative is led globally by the Jane Goodall Institute, Roots and Shoots, and NYUAD has been a part of the initiative since the campaign’s inception.

Jessica Molina, Class of 2020, believes NWN is an opportunity to challenge oneself, and intends to extend her pledge beyond the month into her daily life.

The NWN campaign recognizes the diversity in the types of waste produced by different cultures and lifestyles, and the pledges collected by Ecoherence reflect this diversity. The flexibility of pledges allowed the community to start taking smaller steps to achieve sustainability goals. Some of the pledges made for the month included a commitment to reducing food waste, refraining from purchasing packaged fruits, using reusable water bottles, refusing to use plastic bags, using reusable take away containers, brining reusable cups to Starbucks, having no plastic waste and taking shorter showers. The pledges made by community members were posted on Ecoherence’s Facebook page and put on display around campus.

Monica Yang, Class of 2022, pledged to be vegetarian. She has always wanted to try vegetarianism for a prolonged period but has never had the courage to take the leap. NWN encouraged her by providing a chance to take on the commitment, which became a positive experience that she would like to continue from time to time. NYUAD community members were able to unite their individual sustainability efforts with the NWN pledges.

“I think it’s difficult to feel like you’re making any difference when you make a personal commitment to the environment. That’s why I like NWN so much because it feels like your personal action is a part of a bigger movement and that movement has a real impact in the community. It also helps to keep yourself accountable,” stated Hannah Melville-Rea, Class of 2019 and one of the organizers of NWN at NYUAD.

The campaign has also caused a ripple effect across campus, with the NYUAD library and NYUAD Environmental Health and Safety pledging to have paperless meetings during the month.