Forty-nine pairs of wide eyes blinked back toward the podium, as though they had never seen before.  I allowed silence to hover over the classroom for a moment and then asked, "Did anyone learn something new?"

"I didn't know about the ocean," said one doe-eyed brunette.  "I didn't know about the plastic."

She referred to the Pacific Gire area, somewhere between Hawaii and California.  According to the video lecture featuring William McDonough (produced for Solutia nylon), the Pacific Gire is the equivalent of a giant toilet that never flushes.  Much of the ocean's pollutants are swept and swirled there by ocean currents, but once they arrive there is nowhere else for them to go.  Scientists have been shocked to discover that the plastic in this area exceeds the quantity of marine plant life so greatly that sea birds often die simply because their stomachs are filled with it.

"What about the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico?"

"What about off-gassing, down-cycling, and social justice?"

What about them indeed.  Students have begun asking questions, and will continue to ask more.  IDEC (Interior Design Educators Council) has decided to whole-heartedly support the teaching of Cradle-to-Cradle design in design programs across the country.  A term coined by MBDC founders William McDonough and Michael Braungart, Cradle-to-Cradle protocols call for defiant optimism, city planning fully utilizing solar power, re-captured waste-water, clean public transportation, and commercial environments designed for living people who work, not working people who have no lives.  The strategic philosophy calls for clean air, clean water and clean soil, materials designed so they either fertilize the soil or can be endlessly up-cycled in what is called the technological metabolism.  Cradle-to-Cradle introduced me to hope.  Perhaps we can do more than slow down our journey to self destruction and the annihilation of the planet.  Perhaps we can actually do good.

Time appears to be ripe for such thinking.  In the wake of tragedies such as Katrina, earthquakes in Pakistan and tsunamis to the south, the human community is hungry for positive empowerment.  We want to make a difference, give to others, leave the self-absorbed 80's in the past and move on toward environmental sensitivity.  Related headlines have appeared in various publications.  The cover of Seattle Homes & Lifestyles October 2005 issue proclaimed, "Green Design, 45 Stylish Solutions: Who to Call, Where to go, What to Buy."  This year's January/February issue of Interiors Sources featured a cover story about Mithun's Bert Gregory, and followed it with a caption reading, "Sustainability: Is It more than a trend?"  The writer seemed to think so when he stated, "Green design…is a viable business model that is making significant inroads on its way to becoming the norm rather than the exception."  

As I look into the frightened eyes of sapling designers and read their shock at the consequences of ecological apathy, I am encouraged to think that revelation often leads to motivation.  IDEC design instructors across the United States are increasing course content regarding green design, encouraging the next generation to question the way design business has been run.  Every year these young designers will enter the work force asking a few more questions, challenging a few more standards, and hopefully educating a few more clients about the business and health benefits to be gained by designing with a broad, green perspective.  Who knows?  Maybe someday we'll learn how to do more than save the seagulls of the Pacific Gire.  Perhaps we'll dare to save ourselves.