MUSH Trash Clean-up 2022

Text: Yeeun Hong

Photos & Video: Theodore Brennan

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Huskies MUSH — Our Multicultural Understanding and Service House  — officially joined the Student Council in 2020, with the first service officer Reina Otake. The reason for the official status change was that service was, thankfully, growing to be a more integral part of our school.

(For a more extensive history, see our club's foundational article: "MUSH: Who We are and What We Do".)

As stated in that same article, MUSH’s central vision this school year is to give back to our community and strive to create an equal environment for all. With that in mind, one ongoing aspect of MUSH has been trash cleanup.

Week in and week out, students walk the streets around HIS to keep them clean. Every Thursday, MUSH 2022 students embark from school to pick up trash. They usually pick up litter for 40 minutes to an hour. They have separate bags for burnable, non-combustible trash, and PET bottles and cans. They also take out the trash every week.

Through this local service, MUSH 2022 students have discovered (and repeat MUSH members have rediscovered) the importance of a cleaner environment. Since the club began, the streets where students cleaned up trash have become cleaner than before. Each time students visit a previously cleaned road, their job gets easier — as there is usually less trash. Clean breeds clean as the students see first-hand how their weekly efforts are paying off.

With the snow, MUSH 2022 students have finished picking up trash and will be shifting their efforts to shoveling snow every Thursday from now on in the winter of 2023!

Before setting our attention on the snow season, let's enjoy the video of MUSH students picking up trash. Check it out here and share it with your friends and family on YouTube. Even better, subscribe to the HIS Channel!