My Climate Story: What Got Me Into Sustainability

Ashley Jun ’26

Christine Wu ’25

Returning to America after living in Korea greeted me with a huge culture shock. Spending so much of my childhood in Korea, I was exposed to the specifics of recycling culture, and knowing how to recycle appropriately became a habit. One morning, back in my home in America, I was awakened by the loud noises of a dumpster truck here to pick up our trash. I saw a big, black trash truck driven by two workers. One would come out, grab the garbage and recycling from the bins, and dump them at the back of the car. Once they finished, they departed. Rubbing my eyes, trying to wake myself up from sleep, I frowned in confusion at the different approaches to recycling between the two countries. I couldn’t understand why we used two bins when everything ended up in the same truck, and I noticed people were only separating trash into two categories. In Korea, we constantly distinguish the trash by type: glass, paper, plastic, etc. This culture shocked me, and I was intrigued by where this trash ended up. 

Ultimately, my curiosity led me to research and discover that this trash ended up in landfills, harming our environment. This surprised me and invigorated me to educate myself on sustainability as I was introduced to more topics, such as fast fashion and microplastics. As a person interested in fashion, learning about landfills, ocean pollution, and fast fashion made me truly feel the gravity of climate change. With my sparked passion for sustainability, I continue to interact with other young adults and educators who have helped me learn the impact educational outreach can create. 

Since that morning, I have worked continuously on creating educational sources for young kids to learn more about climate change, especially sources that are easily digestible and can stimulate action and agency within them. I have also created a curriculum for a community service-based program. In this initiative, I attend an elementary school with other mentors and teach the young kids about fast fashion, eco-friendly dyes, and recycling through hands-on activities. For example, we used real flowers and plants to create artwork by imprinting their fruit and plant juice on linen, and we would create artwork using unused paper and plastic bags. The young students would cut the papers into shapes, place them between the plastic bags and colorful beads, and iron the plastic bag to create an art piece they would bring back home. 

Through my experience interacting with educators and doing educational outreach work, I realized the power of hands-on learning and the importance of making information accessible and digestible. Moreover, as I continue to work with community organizations for sustainability awareness, I realize how my culture shock and experience provide a strong foundation for me to continue advocating as a young activist.