Student Reviews
Saturday, April 6th 2013, Rutgers Community Mapping Class and Franklin Township High School led by Dr. Wansoo Im embarked on a cigarette butt mission. Rutgers University as well as many other locations around the world constantly battle problems with the littering of cigarette butts. In order to combat this problem knowledge is key. Our community mapping helped not only map where the location of the cigarettes are but also different receptacles. We collected this information with the hopes of seeing a correlation and hopefully administrative changes will follow. I believe that this project was a complete success; we have been able to show the different locations of cigarette butt and receptacles all within two hours. Studies down the road can use this information in order to help grow this data even more.
-Keith Gibson
Last week, students from Rutgers University and Franklin Township High School collected data for the RUButts cigarette butt mapping project. Personally, I feel that this experience revealed the power of community mapping to increase awareness and effect change. The role of community mapping for this project was to collect data about the abundance and location of cigarette butts on the College Avenue campus. For me, it was most interesting to see the data points slowly increase over the 2 hour data collection period. This data can be used to not only advise Rutgers Facility Management on where cigarette butts exist and where cleanup should be targeted, but also studied to analyze the impact of cigarette butts on the environment. This project can be taken to the next level by mapping cigarette butts during different times of year.
-Roger Kuo
I enjoyed working on this project because we were able to use simple technology to bring light to a very important issue on our campus. Community mapping is very unique because it has the ability to raise awareness about important issues in a very visual way through simple technology. In terms of this specific project, I was very surprised to learn that there were so many cigarette butts littered in such a small area of the College Avenue campus. These types of projects not only impact the general population by making them aware of the issue, but also impact the individuals participating in the mapping by allowing them to see the problem first-hand. The Cigarette butt mapping project has a lot of potential to make the College Avenue campus more environmentally friendly.
-Shamama Siddiqui
The experience of going around College Ave and searching the ground for cigarette butt at first seemed a little weird, but as I mapped the first butt I noticed how they cover the ground without anyone noticing them. Beside just randomly looking for them, there was pattern to where the cigarette butts were found making the mapping even more interesting. For example how on the little pieces of grass between the street and pavement there were large amounts of cigarette butts. Near alleyways there were also concentrated amounts of cigarette butts that got picked up by the wind or water and ended up on the side of the street. The teamwork involved in the project was also very eye opening because it shows how community involvement in projects can help to solve problems.
–Gabriel A. Hidalgo
Survey Questions
Before conducting our community mapping project, we started with a short questionnaire to have an idea of what students thoughts about the problem.
Pre-Survey Questionnaire
1.Do you think there are enough cigarette receptacles on the College Avenue campus?
2.Do you think that cigarette butts littered on campus are a big issue?
3. Where do you think most cigarette butts are littered on campus?
a. Near building entrances
b. Near benches
c. Near bus stops
d. Near cigarette receptacles
4. How often do you see littered cigarette butts on campus?
5. Were you aware that cigarette butts contain many toxic chemicals and can take decades to degrade?
6. Were you aware that toxic chemicals from littered cigarette butts are being carried by wind and rain into the water supply?
We also conducted a short survey after our project. Our post-project survey included:
Post-Survey Questionnaire
1. Were there as many cigarette receptacles on campus as you had thought there would be?
2. After the community mapping event, do you think there should to be more cigarette receptacles placed around the campus?
3. Did you more littered cigarette butts on campus than you had thought you would find?
4. Were garbage cans and cigarette receptacles accessible near areas where cigarette butts were littered?
5. Where were littered cigarette butts most often found?
a.Near building entrances
b.Near benches
c. Near bus stops
d.Near cigarette receptacles
6. Are community mapping events, such as this one, effective in raising awareness about the extent of littered cigarette butts and their harmful impacts on our environment?
7.What is the best way to make people aware of the harmful effects of littered cigarette butts on our campus?
8.How can we make community mapping events, such as this one, more effective in raising awareness about the harmful effects of cigarette butts?