Hello Prof and friends! In this final post, we’ll be concluding what we’ve learnt in this module as well as our reflections. 

We started off the module by learning about important concepts in pollution such as basic pollution chemistry. Next, we learnt about the causes and consequences of different types of pollution – aquatic, air, soil, noise, light and luxury. We ended off the module by studying how we can reduce our ecological footprint and avoid pollution. Throughout this blog, both of us have learnt more about how pollution happens around the world, especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Most of our COVID-19 topics centred around whether the pandemic actually serves as a good break from pollutive activities, or whether the break is too brief and unaffecting. Hopefully, by summarizing these events into bite-sized pieces, you learnt something new too! 

Personally, we both enjoyed learning about dematerialization! We were surprised that our individual water footprints were significantly high. We believe that if the public learns how to dematerialize, it can significantly decrease our local water footprint. However, we acknowledge that it takes time to make extreme changes to our lifestyles thus every small step matters 🙂 Additionally, brainstorming about a possible research topic for pollution was enlightening. We realized that there were many pollution issues in Singapore itself and we were armed with the resources to help. 

It was really informative to learn different types of pollution that are less popularized and talked about in the news media, such as light pollution and soil pollution. It makes you think twice about the impacts of your actions and consumption habits on the environment around you. Ultimately, we hope that this module and this blog have shaped the way you perceive the world before you, and have given you a critical lens to pollution.

Before we end, here’s a picture of the faces behind this blog 🙂 We truly hope it has been a fruitful journey. All the best for your future endeavours & we hope to see you around campus! Don’t forget to say hello!

See you soon,

Adilah and Ellysha