I love seeing the giant reflection pools outside of the BA building with that water spraying up, and I always wondered how they could justify that water when Utah had drought restrictions. During our sustainability tour, the gentlemen from facilities were able to answer so many of those questions, and really put UVU’s water consumption and conservation into perspective for me.
I worked for Alpine School District as a head custodian for 9 years between 2013 and 2022. During that time I was in charge of a lot of the same things facilities explained to us on our tour, but on a much smaller scale. My area was just one elementary school as opposed to one University. I had to deal with the water restrictions during dry years, events or soccer games at the last minute and someone calling me to come shut off the water, broken sprinkler lines (and not knowing when one was broken until someone notified me), dying bushes or trees and having to replace them because they were not getting enough water, wind carrying the mist from small sprinklers and so the edges getting brown on small strips off lawn, and so much more. I received one of those fancy digital sprinkler clocks that hooked to my phone and it made my life so much easier. I was able to see weather patterns, and it would turn off the sprinklers when it rained. If a sprinkler broke, it would turn off that section and alert me instead of shooting a giant stream of water straight into the air for hours on end. The new technology was amazing and probably saved the district a lot of money and water. It also saved me a lot of time, energy, and frustration.
I was able to understand a lot of what they were talking about in the tour as I was one of “them” for many years and loved what I did. I started UVU as a freshman in 1994 (it was UVSC back then) and it has grown a lot in the last 30 years. There are many more buildings, and more grassy areas. There are more parking lots and concrete walkways connecting them all together. As the school is growing in size by building and mass, it is also growing with people and that means more feet that walk over that grass. I think they are really taking all that into account, as they mentioned that they are adding compost to the water that will help the roots become stronger and thicker, to stand up to the extra amount of wear and tear so that it endures more people walking on it, sitting on it, playin on it. They are seeing the bigger picture, and they know they need to keep looking outside of that even further as the school continues to expand, so that they can keep up with technology and sustainability efforts, even if they may seem small.
[Paper written for SOC 3520 class UVU Fall 2024]
Amy Brouwer . 2024 . All Rights Reserved
