11/02/2025
‘The quad’ is a staple of the college experience, front and center on almost every campus. The Great Lawn, for instance, serves as common ground for students, faculty and staff to gather as one Macalester community. Our community’s attention has been especially focused on this space following the recent felling of the large silver maple tree central to the Lawn. Facilities shared in a recent Mac Daily that they and Macalester’s arborist agreed that “despite numerous treatments and regular pruning,” the maple “was old and not thriving anymore, and […] became a safety concern.”
As an environmentally-conscious student, an environmental studies major and an avid enthusiast for wilderness and getting outdoors, the remaining stump of the silver maple inspires other ideas of great change for our campus greenspace. While a de facto symbol of community at Mac, The Great Lawn also represents something more sinister that Macalester can, and should, bring an end to: a system of landscaping at odds with Macalester’s values, reliant on anti-environmental practices and connected to a history of oppression.
https://themacweekly.com/83669/opinion/let-it-grow-a-call-to-rewild-the-great-lawn/