Ecological Footprint

As a part of my Sustainability Marketing class, we are committed to attempting to reduce our ecological footprint. To start, I had to take a test to see what my lifestyle's footprint is. By doing this I was definitely shocked at how what I do impacts the environment. I learned that if everyone lived the way I do, we would need 5.3 earths to sustain that lifestyle, this was a surprise to me because I am a relatively conscious person of what my actions do to the environment. So, I started thinking about my lifestyle and what would really cause my footprint to be so large. Then I realized that my mobility portion was my biggest contributor, and that is because of the large amount of flying that I do. I have a special benefit because my step-mom works for Alaska Airlines, which means that I get to fly for free on them to many different places, and I take full advantage of this perk, so much so that I have flown back and forth from Bellingham to Seattle to commute home, which can contribute to the high footprint. This would be a hard habit to break since my benefits don't last past my college graduation, so I may need to change other parts of my life to help my footprint. 

To help reduce my ecological footprint I am committing to 3 goals that will reduce my impact on the environment:

1. Ride the bus to school 4 out of the 5 days if not everyday, or walk if it is a nice day since I do not live far from campus. 
2. Replace my lunch sandwiches that consist of meat with strictly peanut butter sandwiches, this should be easy since peanut butter is one of my favorite food items. I will not but anymore lunch meat for the remainder of the quarter.  
3. Visit a couple local farms to purchase my fruit and vegetables, Joe's Garden is a mile away from my house so it could be an easy adjustment. 
4. Also, my roommates and I used to recycle a lot but we have lost our commitment to that and I would like to restart our recycling process. We have done it before, so I know we can do it again.