My name is Stefanie Lynch, and I am a graduating senior at Emerson College in Boston, Massachusetts. This spring I joined the Think Outside the Bottlecampaign and organized activities on campus to educate students, faculty and the administration about the social and environmental impacts of bottled water.

In the week leading up to World Water Day (March 22), my student organization, Emerson Peace and Justice, organized water related events each day on campus to raise awareness about the human right to water and to mobilize people to take action challenging the corporate control of water. Last month, the Emerson College Student Government Association (SGA) recognized water as a human right and declared that SGA-recognized organizations are not allowed to use their funds for the purchase of bottled water.

My student government is not alone. I have been working with students at more than 60 colleges and universities across North America that are advancing similar initiatives to get their campuses to Think Outside the Bottle. These students are part of a growing number of people taking action on this campaign. Today, more than 27,000 individuals have taken the Pledge to Think Outside the Bottle and choose tap over bottled water. I have more than 6,000 public comments here that I would like to deliver to you after the meeting. There are also more than 30 restaurants across the country that are no longer serving bottled water and a growing number of cities that are canceling bottled water contracts.

I have organized several Tap Water Challenges on campus and in my community, pitting bottled water against tap water. Most everyone who takes the challenge cannot tell the difference between the tap and leading bottled water brands. This is not surprising when you consider that brands like Aquafina use municipal tap water as their source. However, the source of most bottled water is still news to many people.

One of the biggest complaints I hear from students is about how misleading bottled water marketing is, whether it’s Pepsi’s Aquafina, Coke’s Dasani, or Nestlé’s bottled water brands. So, we are pleased that your corporation has begun labeling Aquafina with source information, but we want to make sure you don’t simply replace one cover-up with a new label that continues the misleading marketing.

We believe that now is the time to continue responding to people’s concerns. When will you provide consumers with information on breaches in water quality for your Aquafina bottled water?

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