On Nov. 9th, the Orange County Environmental Justice (OCEJ) Youth Committee held an electronic waste recycling event at the Saint Irenaeus Catholic Church. Founded by Oxford senior Rachel Yoon, the youth committee encourages students to bring awareness to environmental issues around Orange County through drives and services like the recycling event.
“I created OCEJ Youth because I felt like aside from environmental clubs at schools, there’s not many opportunities for [the] youth like us to get involved in important environmental justice topics. When I came across a soil-lead campaign from OCEJ, I thought that it was a really important matter that wasn’t being discussed by high schoolers. So I gathered these students to engage and bring up awareness for important topics like soil-lead contamination, water contamination, and just inequities in general across Orange County.” Yoon said.
This event was the result of a three month long process of planning by four committees: activities, marketing, ambassadors, and newsletter. The team had worked with California Electronics, planning out the logistics of the date, time, and budget, and advertising it by publicizing flyers and reaching out to more schools.
“It was a long process, but it was worth it.” Yoon said.
The Youth Committee chose to recycle e-waste products after weighing on various options, such as clothes or canned foods, due to its convenience and efficiency.
“We decided on e-waste because it [old electronic appliances] is something that a lot of families have but don’t use anymore.” Oxford junior Luke Mclean, a member of the activities committee said.
However, they had some complications regarding the location of their drive—the event was originally planned to be set at a convention center, but due to unavailable spots, the team had come across St. Irenaeus Catholic Church.
“Since there were a lot of volunteers that attend Oxford Academy, it was the most convenient since it was very local.” Mclean said.
This change ended up benefiting the team as many families were able to easily drop off their old electronics at a nearby drive.
The event marked the second drive of the school year, the first one taking place in early August, which members were quick to note at how much they had improved since then.
“Our first drive took place at an alleyway in Santa Ana which wasn’t the best location for a drive. We had only like three drop offs the whole time and eventually decided that for this one we definitely needed to get more local.” Mclean said.
The event even inspired people who are not affiliated with the organization to volunteer.
“I have known about OCEJ [Youth] for a while, but I decided to volunteer because I am taking AP Environmental Science at Oxford Academy and the focus of that class is talking about the environment and our personal impact on it. I think it really drove me to come out here to help raise awareness and this drive.” Oxford Academy junior Vihan Revagad said.
The dedication and hard work from this group of students drove the success of collecting over 1000 lbs of e-waste from the drive. With more drives from the OCEJ Youth Committee, Orange County can see a brighter future of their environment.
