to my opinion
A smoker’s plague on campus
Staff Columnist
It’s discouraging when even as a smoker you are disgusted with other smokers. Have you been to the smoking shelters around campus? I guess smokers deserve a pat on the back for even acknowledging the existence of said smoking shelters, but really it is getting ridiculous. The cigarette butts litter the ground in such astounding amounts that it’s like walking on some sick carpet.
I would try to blame the school clean-up crew for not emptying the ashtrays often enough, but I decided to do an experiment on the matter. I grabbed what little butts were in the ashtray and dumped them in the garbage bin after asserting myself that they were properly extinguished. I then sat down for an hour across from the smoking shelter (between the 1800 and 1700 building) and waited and watched. Now the ashtray was emptied out at 10:15. By 11:30 I decided to put down my book and check the ashtray. I was shocked to find 15 cigarette butts lying in the ashtray in various stages of well… being smoked. Not bad right? Not all the way full, maybe a empty cup of coffee that can go in the can three feet away but yes, the ashtray is being used. Here is the zinger in this story, no less than 65 people stopped by to smoke their cigarettes in this particularly heavy traffic zone.
Smoking shelter litter
You do the math: How many students decided that a better way to dispose of their cigarette butts was to throw them to the ground? If we add the reciprocal and carry the one, let’s all say it together: 50 students. In the span of roughly one hour, these students littered the ground with at the very least 50 cigarette butts. There were four (!) mostly empty ashtrays not five feet away and that was only one hour. More math fun? Calculate how many butts would litter the ground if janitorial services didn’t pick them up in a week, a month, heck, even a quarter.
Shoreline Community College has the luxury of having one of the nicest, greenest campuses in Greater Seattle. Go to the block of concrete they call a college down at North Seattle Community College if you disagree. Greenery and other fine foliage surround us; it’s a shame that some students litter to the point of its becoming just sick.