SFGate gets right to the point in a recent headline: "Thousands of college students trashed a California lake." About 3,000 of them, according to Debbie Carlisi of the US Forest Service's Shasta-Trinity National Forest, who says crews at Shasta Lake spent six hours scooping up the bottles, cans, plastic wrappers, pool floats, and other remnants left behind by students from UC Davis and the University of Oregon over Memorial Day weekend, per the Guardian.
Trash even ended up in the lake itself. "That's going to cause a problem with our fish and wildlife, and it decreases the recreation experience for our next visitors," Carlisi notes, per SFGate. The students had rented out about 130 houseboats on the lake's Slaughterhouse Island, and they'd promised park officials they would clean up after themselves. Carlisi said officials even gave the students trash bags in advance. "Some students used them. Some students didn't," she tells CBS News. Due to the rocky terrain and hazardous water conditions, officials will have to wait until late June or early July, when the water recedes, to retrieve trash at the bottom of the lake.
The two colleges have issued statements on the incident. "The garbage left behind does not represent the values of our institution," was the mea culpa from the University of Oregon, per KGW. The statement added that although the trip wasn't "a university sanctioned or sponsored event," it was "attended by university students, many of whom are members of university-recognized fraternities and sororities." UC Davis similarly said the event wasn't school sanctioned and said it's "exploring ways of working with students to help restore the site or otherwise address the situation," per the Guardian. Carlisi tells SFGate she doesn't think the schools themselves should be blamed for what happened. (More college students stories.)
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