Wildlife Promise » Sustainable Living

Less Water, More Wildlife — What’s Not to Love about Native Plants?

Judith Kohler — Thu, 16 May 2013 19:20:12 +0000

These prairie winecups are among the plants native to Colorado. Photo by the National Wildlife Federation.

Some gardeners want to cut their water and chemical use. Others want to attract more butterflies, birds and bees.

Whatever the reason, Denver-area gardeners seem to be increasingly interested in indigenous flowers, grasses and shrubs. Every May for the past seven years, the Boulder office of the National Wildlife Federation has been a key stop for those gardeners. The staff sponsors what’s believed to be a one-of-a-kind event in the Denver area – an all-native plant sale.

Ranger Rick helps one of the volunteers at the 2012 National Wildlife Federation Native Plant Sale. NWF Photo

This year, Eirin Bareis, a horticulturist with Denver Parks and Recreation, has helped the NWF staff select the plants. She’ll be on hand this Saturday for the Eighth Annual NWF Native Plant Sale and recently answered a few questions about planting native.

NWF: What are some of advantages of native plants?
Eirin: There are quite a few advantages. I would say first and foremost is the habitat value. There are certain native insects that will take nectar only from the native wild flowers. Secondly, I would say the plants do not need the increased fertilizer. They do not need, for the most part, high irrigation. Since they are native plants, they can exist on very low fertilizer, just what exists in the soil, and also exist on the precipitation we get in this area. And the native plants are perennials, so you’ll get to enjoy them year after year. They’re not something you’re going to have to pull up every season. They’re going to pop up every spring.

NWF: How do native plants benefit wildlife?
Eirin: When you plant natives, you’re creating an insectary. What I mean by that is you’re creating a place for beneficial insects to reside that are either going to pollinate our vegetables or fruit trees or they’re actually going to eat or kill some of the pests in our garden. We have 17 species at the plant sale that are honey-bee attractors. We also have hummingbird-attractor plants, plants that are good for butterflies and also plants that are wonderful nesting habitat for our local bird species.

NWF: Do native plants require less water than non-native plants?
Eirin: If they’re planted in the micro-climate that they’re supposed to be planted in, they exist on what is termed moderate to low water. That’s water two or fewer times a week.

NWF: Is interest in native plants growing?
Eirin: I think so. I’ve only lived in Denver for three years, but since (the drought in) 2002, with the low water use, people began to get interested in low-water-use plants and that naturally turned toward some of our indigenous plants in the area. It’s so important for us to be using native plants to show the landscape vernacular that used to exist here – the prairies, the grasslands. The native grasses are wonderful habitat and foundation plants in the landscape. The keystone species to our short grass prairie is blue grama and it’s host to a Colorado alpine butterfly. A taller grass species, big bluestem, is host to two rare skipper butterflies.

NWF: Does Denver plant native vegetation in its parks?
Eirin: We have the more traditional parks that I think a lot of people are familiar with, which has the Kentucky bluegrass. Starting in 2006, conversion sites were defined, starting with four parks in the city. They were converted to short-grass prairie. So, there’s been a large movement. Now, just in my district, I have about 350 acres of native short-grass prairie areas. We’re going to be seeing less and less Kentucky blue grass and more native areas being planted.

The columbine is one of the most popular native plants of Colorado gardeners. Photo by John Gale.

NWF: What’s a good tip about native plants?
Eirin: I think the unique part of a lot of the native plants is selecting them and knowing when they’re going to bloom because a lot of native plants have a slightly shorter blooming cycle than traditional annuals. But when you combine all different species of native plants, you really have a long blooming cycle, from the early spring all the way into the fall. You’re going to notice a lot more seasonality within your garden when you have native plants.

Outside Denver? You Can Still Go Native!

Learn more about choosing and cultivating native plants, then turn your yard into a Certified Wildlife Habitat ® site. This month only, Garden For Wildlife Month, NWF will plant a native tree in your honor when you certify your property.

A Fight for Real Food – Food Revolution Day

Guest Author — Thu, 16 May 2013 12:33:34 +0000

The second annual Food Revolution Day on May 17 is fast approaching but there are still plenty of ways to get involved!

Learning how to cook is one of the most valuable skills you can ever obtain. These skills were once passed down from generation to generation, but now millions of people lack even the most basic skills — as a result, it’s costing millions of lives and billions of dollars to cope with the increase in diet-related diseases. We need to get back to basics and share our cooking skills and knowledge so that everyone has access to good, nutritious food from scratch.

Food Revolution Day is a global day of action for people to make a stand for good food and essential cooking skills. It’s a chance for people to come together within their homes, schools, workplaces, and communities to cook and share their kitchen skills, food knowledge and resources. Food Revolution day aims to raise awareness about the importance of good food and better food education for everyone.

Eco-Schools USA, through our Sustainable Food and Healthy Living pathways, are proud to support and participate in Food Revolution Day.

What can you do for Food Revolution Day at school:

Get students excited about fresh produce by planting fruit and vegetable seeds on the day. Cress is a nice and easy starting point, as well as lettuce or tomatoes.
Food Revolution Day
Download the Food Revolution Day Yogurt Pops recipe and give students a healthy dessert idea by showing them how to whip up the ingredients and freeze them in plastic molds. Click the link to find other recipe ideas.
Bring different fruits and vegetables into class and get students to taste them and guess what they are. If they’re older get them to do a blind taste test. Also discuss seasonality of fruits and vegetables – eating seasonally is a good thing – produce tends to be cheaper and tastier and it’s better for the environment!
Arrange a tour of the local farmer’s market.
Utilize the tools found at our Eco-Schools USA Food Revolution Day page.
Need more ideas? Check out this Food Revolution Day School Ideas Google Hangout.

Watch and join Jamie Oliver along with millions all over the world in the fight for REAL FOOD!

Click here to view the embedded video.

A guest post from the Food Revolution Day team in the UK!

Senate Farm Bill Protects Soil, Water, Wildlife

Anne Goddard — Tue, 14 May 2013 18:31:59 +0000

“Basic soil and wetland protection requirements were extended to apply to crop insurance premium subsidies.”

The National Wildlife Federation commends Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) and Ranking Member Thad Cochran (R-MS) for their leadership in crafting and moving out of committee a strong, bipartisan reauthorization of the farm bill.

“The Senate farm bill includes an historic agreement between agriculture and conservation organizations to ensure that basic soil and wetland protection requirements were extended to apply to crop insurance premium subsidies,” said Julie Sibbing, director of Agriculture and Forestry Programs, National Wildlife Federation.

“NWF thanks the Committee members for their support of the agreement, especially Senator Saxby Chambliss (R-GA), who successfully offered an amendment to attach these provisions to crop insurance on the Senate floor last year and who stood up for the agreement in committee today.”

“We also thank Chairwoman Stabenow for standing up against amendments that would have weakened the current requirements to protect soil and wetlands as a condition of receiving subsidies.”

The National Wildlife Federation praises the inclusion of a number of modifications to the farm bill, including:

an amendment by Senator Thune (R-SD) to ensure tracking of conversion of native prairies to crop production,
an amendment by Senator Bennett (D-CO) to make the new easement program work better for protection of native grasslands
an amendment by Senator Donnelly (D-IN) to begin to address the issue of risk management coverage for energy crops
an amendment by Sen. Heitkamp (D-NV) to allow the Natural Resources Conservation Service to have more say over how to allocate technical assistance programs among programs

“The Senate Agriculture Committee passed a farm bill today which seeks to minimize the effects of cuts to conservation and energy programs, and includes important protections for soil, water, wildlife and declining grassland ecosystems,” Sibbing said. “We look forward to working with them to pass a final farm bill this year that includes these important protections.”

Ensure that worthy Farm Bill conservation programs are reauthorized at appropriate levels, structured to achieve maximum wildlife and environmental benefits, and fully funded during the annual appropriations process.

For more National Wildlife Federation news visit www.nwf.org/news

The National Wildlife Federation is America’s largest conservation organization inspiring Americans to protect wildlife for our children’s future.

Announcing Campus Conservation Nationals Video Contest Winners!

Sara Gassman — Wed, 01 May 2013 18:18:12 +0000

As part of Campus Conservation Nationals 2013, NWF Campus Ecology hosted a video contest encouraging students to creatively showcase their energy and water-saving initiatives.

If you happened to spend time on a college campus between February 4 and April 26, 2013, you may have noticed that dorm buildings were darker than usual, and that students may have smelled a little bit more funky. In the name of resource use reduction, 300,000 students at 120 colleges and universities across the country switched off lights and took shorter showers as part of Campus Conservation Nationals. CCN is the largest water and electricity use reduction competition at colleges and universities in the country. A partnership between the National Wildlife Federation, Lucid Design Group, U.S. Green Building Council and the Alliance to Save Energy, CCN is in its third year. Each year, the program engages an increasing number of campuses and the kilowatt-hours and gallons of water saved also get larger!

In 2013, the 300,000 student competitors saved 2,114,844 kilowatt-hours of electricity, enough to power 187 U.S. homes for a year, and equivalent to 2,426,040 pounds of CO2! Students were also able to save 1,681,241 gallons of water, equivalent to 11,208 shower hours. That’s almost 31 years of taking a one-hour shower every day–and nearly a 100 shower-hour increase over the 2012 water savings!

CCN gives students a common voice and motivation to hundreds of thousands of students, all working together to reduce consumption and mitigate the impacts of climate change. Upon registering for CCN, colleges and universities tailored the contest to their specific preferences–choosing to pit on-campus residences against each other, or to rally the entire campus to save more than other schools in their region or state. Schools in New York, California, Kentucky competed in small groups to see which could take the top prize. In California, the Alliance to Save Energy hosted a PowerSave Green Campus competition. California State University Chico won, having reduced electricity use 12.8%, beating out nine other CSU and UC school to take home the prize.

NWF’s Campus Ecology program hosted a CCN video contest, offering a $1,000 grand prize to the school with the best video documenting students taking positive actions on their campus. Earlham College in Indiana won best video, featuring strategies to reduce energy and water usage on campus with more than 500 votes from CCN participants. Watch the 2013 CCN video program featuring campuses competing this spring below, or visit the Campus Ecology facebook page.

Celebrate CCN 2013 by watching the CCN video program! Click the image to watch on YouTube.

“The video submissions this year were really tremendous,” said Kristy Jones, senior manager, Campus Ecology. “The videos are inspiring documentation of the kind of creative actions students are taking to address climate change and improve the sustainability of their universities.”

Congratulations to the 9 video contest entrants, and to all the resource-saving winners who participated in Campus Conservation Nationals 2013! Stay tuned for updates and get ready for CCN 2014!

NWF’s Campus Ecology Program has been a lead partner on Campus Conservation Nationals since 2011. Before 2011, NWF hosted its own green campus competition, Chill Out, showcasing students, faculty and staff taking action for the environment. NWF’s Campus Ecology Program works with more than half of the nation’s 4,100 colleges and universities to advance climate action and sustainability on campus and in the community.

1-2-3-4, Who’re We Gonna Cheer For? Eco-Schools!

Judith Kohler — Wed, 01 May 2013 16:28:27 +0000

Students at Copper Mesa Elementary School raise the school’s Eco-Schools USA Green Flag. Photo by Judith Kohler

“Way to go Cougars!” a student at Copper Mesa Elementary in Highlands Ranch exclaimed as the gym full of students cheered.

The occasion was a kind of pep assembly at the Denver-area school, but it was unlike any pep assembly I remember attending. The kids weren’t cheering for a sports team; they were excited about earning a Green Flag, the highest honor in the Eco-Schools USA program. The students didn’t sing the school fight song; they recited Copper Mesa’s “eco-code.”

“You’re part of an elite group of schools and students,” said Ann Morgan, executive director of the National Wildlife Federation’s Rocky Mountains and Prairies Regional Center.

Ann Morgan, executive director of the regional NWF office, presents a Green Flag to Flagstone Elementary School.

Morgan presented Green Flags to Copper Mesa and Flagstone Elementary School in Castle Rock, south of the Denver area. NWF is the U.S. host of the Eco-Schools program, an international network of 41,000 K-12 schools in 53 countries.

The two Douglas County schools are the first in Colorado to earn Green Flags and as of April 25, were just the 14^th and 15^th nationwide.

Students at both schools were clothed in several different shades of green to mark the special day. During an outdoor assembly, Flagstone students waved green paper flags attached to pencils. Parents stood around the outside of the group, taking pictures and clapping along with the kids when the Eco-Schools flag was hoisted up the flagpole.

The raising of the Green Flags followed a lot of work by students and school staffs. Copper Mesa has saved more than 127,000 kilowatt hours of electricity the past three years with the help of energy audits. The school has saved about $400 by using both sides of copy paper and decreased trash pick-ups from five to two days a week.

Flagstone has reduced the amount of waste left from school lunches. The school provides vegetables for the community from its garden and has built and located bluebird houses to enhance the birds’ population.

Flagstone Elementary studets cheer as their school is awarded the Green Flag. Photo by Judith Kohler

Flagstone Principal Kelli Smith said the kids don’t hesitate to make sure the adults are being eco-friendly.

“They found I left my light on once and they haven’t let me forget it,” she said.

Members of Copper Mesa’s student “Green Team” said the work has been worth it.

“We’ve had to be like a team,” 10-year-old Hailey Merrill said. “It’d be really cool if all the other schools could do it, too.”

National Wildlife Federation’s Jim Lyon Motivates Virginia Students to Lead for the Environment this Earth Day 2013

Julian Keniry — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 22:04:57 +0000

Nearly 130 student leaders, faculty and staff gathered at the Northern Virginia Community College (NVCC) this Earth Day, April 22, 2013, to hear from National Wildlife Federation’s (NWF’s) Jim Lyon about how the community can address climate change throughout the State of Virginia. “We were thrilled with the event turn out and with Jim’s talk,” said Rob Johnson, sustainability coordinator at NVCC, who wrote a guest post on the event for NWF’s Wildlife Promise blog.

Why higher education leadership for the environment in Virginia is important

“NWF started the Campus Ecology Program back in 1989, Mr. Lyon explained, because NWF knew higher education needs to lead the solutions to the conservation and wildlife challenges we are facing and to ensure that the graduates of today are prepared to lead the solutions of tomorrow.”

Colleges and universities, he explained, are places where people from all walks of life expect to see solutions demonstrated in practice, whether wind turbines, solar panels or electric recharge stations. Hands-on conservation and sustainability go hand-in-hand with the curriculum.

Campuses, clean economy and healthy wildlife connections in Virginia

“It is no longer business as usual for protecting wildlife, explained Lyon. We can’t simply set aside land and water, or regulate for clean air and clean water, although all of that is critical. We also have to look upstream to the impacts on wildlife and habitats- and there we can see that it is our building choices, our energy choices, our transportation choices and all of those need to be overhauled for a clean, safe, 21st Century.”

Reducing carbon pollution to zero within the lifetimes of Virginia college students today

“The challenge to society is to reduce carbon pollution to nearly zero before 2050, or within the lifetimes of most college students today,” Lyon explained. “This means that we are not talking here about being trained to recycle aluminum cans, although that is certainly a part of the solution. We are talking here about a much larger shift- educating students to scale solutions to the scope of the problem.”

“While this can be a daunting challenge,” admitted Jim, “it is the conservation fight of a lifetime. The fact is 99% of scientists overwhelming agree human reliance on fossil fuels is destabilizing the climate. Is this the legacy we want to leave our children or even the current generations of students today?”

How Virginia colleges and other universities are leading

Jim highlighted several examples of higher education leadership in Virginia, including:

Dabney S. Lancaster Community College’s Wind Turbine Service Technology program prepares individuals for career entry and advancement opportunities in the advanced technology applications of wind energy technologies.
Randolph College has an organic garden & orchard, an extensive recycling center that accepts CFLs, electronics, CDs, DVDs, in addition to glass, plastic, aluminum and cardboard. Through NWF’s partner, the American College and University Presidents’ Climate Commitment (ACUPCC), Randolph has commitment to reduce the campus’s carbon footprint through energy efficiency, renewable energy, and other strategies.
George Mason University’s (GMU) Board of Visitors, in 2007, pledged that the university would build all new construction to a higher environmental standard, specifically, LEED Silver certification level. In addition to two certified National Wildlife Habitats, GMU has purchases 10% of its annual electricity through wind powered Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs), avoiding over 17 million pounds of CO2 emissions, which is like taking almost 1,500 cars off the road for a year or like powering 963 homes for a year!
Northern Virginia Community College is committed to green building. NVCC’s newly-opened Student Services Building on the Annandale campus recently received their LEED certification award (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design); the student services building is the first LEED Certified building at NVCC. More of NVCC’s campuses will feature LEED buildings soon – Manassas, Woodbridge campuses, etc.
Thomas Nelson Community College installed two solar panels to power the lights, ventilation and battery chargers for its motorcycle storage containers used for the campus’s motorcycle safety courses) that are located adjacent to a campus parking lot.

Virginia students gain some greener career insights

These kinds of programs help students prepare for a growing array of greener career opportunities throughout Virginia, he noted. Drawing on labor market studies developed through the Greenforce Initiative (a partnership with Jobs for the Future and National Wildlife Federation sponsored by the Bank of America Charitable Trust at 100 community colleges in six states), Lyon highlighted some of the Virginia specific job trends of relevance to students.

For example, some of the top green jobs by category in Virginia, include pollution reduction, removal & remediation (with 3402 postings), energy efficiency (with 2148 postings), and natural resource conservation (with 1859 postings). Among the top 10 green skills in Virginia, Lyon explained, are scheduling, HVAC, and inspection, while the leading green certifications in Virginia, include professional engineers, certified safety professionals and certified energy managers.

“We’ll need solar financers, project managers and installers and an array of other renewable energy technologies in Virginia,” explained Lyon, including offshore wind. We’ll also need people skilled in climate mitigation and adaptation, restoring habitat and protecting biodiversity for people and wildlife.”

***

Graduate with Zero Carbon Debt!

Sara Gassman — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 14:30:25 +0000

Congratulations to the Class of 2013 for graduating with zero carbon debt!! Image via Microsoft Clip Art.

I’m sure you don’t need anyone else to tell you that college graduates these days are entering the “real world” with no shortage of student loan debt. But there’s another type of debt that many graduates and institutions of higher education (and almost all other institutions for that matter) incur: carbon debt.

As an aside, I thought I was really clever and came up with the term carbon debt all on my own but then I googled it and…Oxford, the world’s most trusted dictionaries, even has a definition. Carbon debt is a thing! Just to make sure that you, Oxford and I are on the same page, carbon debt is “the imbalance between the carbon footprint of a particular country, group, person, etc., and any carbon offsetting that has been agreed or undertaken to counteract this.” In simpler terms, if you have carbon debt, you and your lifestyle choices produce more CO2 than your environment uses.

But don’t get upset! Don’t get discouraged! Carbon debt is easily relieved! You can drive less, eat local and lower on the food chain and plant some trees. And, you can invest in carbon offsets!

NWF Campus Ecology and Carbonfund.org Foundation are partnering to offer premium pricing to campuses looking to offset their carbon emissions. Click the photo to visit the NWF Carbonfund.org page.

NWF Campus Ecology and the Carbonfund.org Foundation are partnering to offer campuses an affordable carbon offset opportunity that will:

Help your campus achieve carbon neutrality
Finance climate projects in three different categories
1. Renewable energy and methane
2. Energy efficiency and carbon credits
3. Reforestation and avoided deforestation
Support NWF Campus Ecology programming

If carbon offsets make you feel like that vegetarian who eats bacon in secret, rest assured that all Carbonfund.org offset projects are third-party verified, certified and audited. Carbon offsets are the perfect way to account for emissions resulting from events (sports games and, ahem, graduation ceremonies) and travel, and can be a bridge between the present and your campus’s self-supplying energy future as it builds that infrastructure. Investing in Carbonfund.org’s innovative offset projects–landfill methane gas-to-energy conversion operations in the northeast, reforestation along the banks of the Mississippi River and truck stop electrification across the country– is something your campus can do while continuing to increase energy efficiency and building its own, on-site renewable energy portfolio.

So here’s an idea for that graduation check from your great-uncle Harry: how about you invest it (or at least part of it, because let’s be real, graduating from college requires a bit of cash in the “celebration” fund) in a climate action project so you can graduate knowing that the CO2 emitted throughout your college career is being absorbed by climate-smart projects throughout the country and even the world. Better yet, pay a visit to the Commencement Committee, and ask them to look into offsetting your graduation ceremony.

If you have questions about Carbonfund.org offsets on your campus, email NWF Campus Ecology’s resident carbon offset expert, Kristy Jones at jonesk@nwf.org.

And most of all, HAPPY GRADUATION!! We wish we could sign all of your yearbooks personally with our soy ink pens, but just know that we have loved working with you! Best of all, this isn’t goodbye! Be sure to stay in touch by joining the NWF Emerging Leaders Initiative, which supports recent grads and young professionals (that’s you!) as they embark on careers in the environmental and conservation fields. The Emerging Leaders Initiative offers opportunities such as fellowships, leadership skills and professional development training, networking and more!

Keep in touch!

Love,

The NWF Campus Ecology Team

Earth Day Celebrations on Campus

Sara Gassman — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 15:00:16 +0000

Students at colleges and universities across the nation and even across the world have been celebrating Earth Day yearly since its inception in 1970. Many colleges and universities host an array of events throughout “Earth Week” and even “Earth Month,” rallying students from all corners of campus—science, business, liberal arts majors and beyond—to take action and learn about the third planet from the sun. Campus Earth Day celebrations are gaining popularity as colleges and universities continue to increase not only “behind-the-scenes” sustainability measures such as improving the energy efficiency of buildings, but also to promote environmentally responsible habits through energy and water waste reduction competitions like Campus Conservation Nationals. Earth Day events also offer campuses the opportunity to engage with local, sustainable businesses and to educate and involve community members in protecting natural resources and wildlife habitats in the region.

Community members attend the Somerset Community College 2012 celebration. Photo credit Somerset Community College 2012 Earth Day Celebration.

If you have yet to decide how you are going to celebrate this particular day (April 22 in case you forgot), we here at NWF Campus Ecology suggest browsing our Campus Sustainability Case Study Database—searching for “earth day” brings up 44 projects and events that campuses have shared with us over the past few decades—we think you’ll find it all highly inspirational. Below are two highlights from our database and my personal favorite campus Earth Day celebrations to get you in the planet-party planning mode! We hope you will document your campus Earth Day activities and share them with us on facebook to include in our “Campus Earth Day Celebrations 2013” album.

At Somerset Community College in Somerset, Kentucky, the Earth Day celebration has grown to include over 750 college students and community members in 2012, up from just 100 participants in 2005. The 2012 celebration included a farmers market, resources about solar panels and electric vehicles, as well as free compact fluorescent light bulbs and reusable grocery bags for attendees. Somerset CC comments, “at the heart of the event is the aim to educate the community about sustainability, which includes caring for the environment and reducing the amount of energy and natural resources consumed.”

Bridgewater State University in Bridgewater, Massachusetts challenged students to a “Top Sustainability Chef” competition as part of their Earth Week 2012 schedule. Three students crafted dishes using all organic ingredients, including the “not-so-secret clean food ingredient,” organic mushrooms, in 30 minutes for judges including a “clean food” cookbook author. “Top Sustainability Chef” participants produced Thai chicken curry, asparagus and mushrooms and raw corn and avocado soup during lunchtime in one of Bridgewater’s dining halls, thus promoting organic and local foods to over 300 passersby.

UNH SEAC will celebrate the 20th annual Solarfest, a solar-powered music and arts festival this year. Photo credit Abigail Gronberg.

And now for a personal favorite! This year, the University of New Hampshire’s Student Environmental Action Coalition will host the 20^th annual Solarfest—an all-day, solar-powered music festival in Durham, New Hampshire. Each year around Earth Day, the Sunweaver solar bus rolls up to UNH with its 800 watt solar array, providing power for nonstop music from 11 am to sunset for thousands of students and community members. Solarfest is a way for students to unwind before finals and to culminate a typically jam-packed Earth Week. The event also features local cuisine, artists and businesses, student organizations and community environmental resources.

How are YOU celebrating Earth Day? Earth Week, Earth Month, Earth Year, Earth Century…Earth Millennium?! Comment below, and share photos of your events with Campus Ecology on facebook throughout the month of April.

More Earth Day resources:

My favorite collection of photos from across the nation on Earth Day 1970
Watch Earth Week 1970, a CBS News special with Walter Cronkite, in 15 parts on YouTube (I promise this is just as awesome as it sounds)
Search the NWF Campus Ecology Campus Sustainability Case Study Database for Earth Day and other “green” events at colleges and universities

Advancing US Workforce for 21st Century: National Thought Leaders Convene

Julian Keniry — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 04:28:30 +0000

What are the skills needed for a competitive, 21st century workforce? How are US community colleges helping to meet these needs? What is the role of employers? Policy-makers? Students and other stakeholders?

Smart Grid to Battery Storage:

These were among the topics deliberated by 45 national workforce and education thought leaders who convened this week at the Pew Conference Center in Washington, DC for “Sustainability Skills Matter,” a meeting hosted by the Greenforce Initiative, a joint-program of the National Wildlife Federation’s Campus Ecology Program and Jobs for the Future with support from the Bank of America Charitable Foundation. The meeting was co-sponsored by the American Association of Community College’s SEED Center and the Center on Wisconsin Strategy (COWS).

“We are seeing a shift in the economy,” observed Kevin Coyle, vice president for education and training at the National Wildlife Federation, but it is in its infancy; we need to be prepared across multiple sectors and our leaders need to be educated. A smarter grid is one example: $150 billion per year is lost on power outages across the grid. Battery storage, transportation- will also change soon.”

Brenda Dan-Messier, assistant secretary United States Department of Education, noted that efforts such as this convening help the US ”implement President Obama’s inaugural statement that, ‘We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations.”‘

Linking Colleges and Strengthening Credentials:

“Connecting community colleges via public transport to the local town or city would be a key way to reduce CO2 emissions and congestion,” explained architect and transportation planner, Susan Herre. ”It would also introduce young people early on to the walk-transit lifestyle, making them more discerning consumers of neighborhood types as they choose where to work and live after graduation.”

To effectively advance projects like these along with students’ skill sets, Jane Weissman, president and CEO of the Interstate Renewable Energy Council (IREC), encouraged community colleges to offer industry-vetted credentials.

State and System-wide Skills Evaluation:

In addition to offering credentials in specialized industries, Rob Holsten, dean of continuing education and sustainability at Wilson Community College in North Carolina, described the “system-wide curriculum review process undertaken in North Carolina to better align education across multiple disciplines with today’s economy, including adding employer competencies and creating a common core for all technical programs.”

Workforce Priorities for Sustainability Emerge:

Employers, industry association, higher education and ngo leaders from agriculture, renewable energy, manufacturing and transportation sectors, developed more than 150 ideas in nine categories, including ways to deepen engagement with employers, support community college capacity, link the classroom to real-world project experience, increase awareness to expand demand for sustainability skills and improve labor market information.

Eight key recommendations emerged through an on-line comment, prioritization and voting system administered by FacilitatePro. Among these were:

Engaging leading employers to better inform community and other colleges about the sustainability skills they value and want.
Integrating sustainability skills into every career pathway.
Providing more paid internship programs, mentoring and apprenticeships and other “hands on” training opportunities for students so they can demonstrate skills, knowledge and abilities.
Using campus-based projects as an opportunity to teach real-world application of sustainability skills for students.
Exploring opportunities to help businesses make their operations more sustainable and linking education and training around sustainability skills to this.
Working with economic development groups to identify sustainability skills needed by new potential employers in a region.
Connecting sustainability skills to existing state efforts to recruit manufacturing employers and connecting community colleges to these employers for skills development and work experience or employment opportunities, and
Identifying industries with an aging workforce and encouraging them to protect the future competitiveness of their industry by partnering with colleges to redesign and redeliver more effective training program (noting the example of PG&E in CA providing internships and apprenticeships together with 27 community colleges.)

“Ultimately, with the help of our community colleges and employers,” said Coyle, “values and attitudes will change and we will have a kinder, gentler and cleaner world.”

Farm to Table: Sustainable Food in Higher Education

Eriqah Foreman-Williams — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 21:02:53 +0000

On April 5, Campus Ecology’s Georgia Campus Sustainability Network (GCSN) hosted a workshop on sustainable food for the our Spring Topic Specific Workshop series. Thirty-seven participants from colleges and universities across the state came to Georgia Southern University to learn and brainstorm on sustainable dining at their institutions. These attendees included students, faculty and administrators.

The ideology of “sustainable dining” is a fairly new concept on campuses. While students and universities have been focusing on energy efficiency and policy, of course important issues, there has been another looming shift in our country where people are beginning to focus on their food and what their body intakes. We’re not just talking calorie counting, but examining what farmers and food processors put in the things we eat. In the light of this shift, students are demanding their school dining services think about these things as well. Additionally, how far food travels is a considering factor. Reducing the carbon footprint of your campus includes decreasing the distance your food is travelling from “Farm to Table”. Basically, buying local, naturally grown produce and naturally fed meat is important for the sustainability of human health and the health of our planet. And of course, in a still largely agricultural state like Georgia, opportunities for this should not be hard to find.

Friday’s workshop began with a keynote from K. Rashid Nuri, founder of Truly Living Well Center for Natural Urban Agriculture. Truly Living Well is an organization with two community gardens in Metro Atlanta’s urban neighborhoods. However, they do much more than gardening. TLW has a number of programs educating Atlanta and the state community on urban agriculture. Nuri came and gave a very inspirational speech on his background, starting Truly Living Well and his opinions on urban farming. We were reminded of why we were there and why this work is so important.

Jett Hatthaway’s lunch time presentation on Kennesaw State Students for Environmental Sustainability’s new student run farmer’s market

The rest of the workshop included a panel discussion with experts from every step on the path of sustainable food to your plate, a project description from Kennesaw State University’s Students for Environmental Sustainability on their student-run and revenue generating farmer’s market, and presentations from Real Food Challenge and Emory Dining on sharing their practices from the student and administrator sides to promote local, healthy food on campus. The day concluded with a trip to a local meat grower, Hunter Cattle Farm in Brooklet, where the participants were given a tour and volunteered a bit on the farm with some of the routine duties. The tour guides stressed the importance of grass-fed beef and organic feeding of the animals they raise for human health. This sparked conversations on the natural diet of the food we eat and the pesticides and steroids often used in mass production farming.

Campus Ecology’s Southeast Campus Field Coordinator, Eriqah Foreman-Williams, holding two new friends at Hunter Cattle Farm in Brooklet, GA

Overall, this workshop was about giving people examples of best practices from other institutions and shedding light on strategies from different experts so we can build upon this knowledge. Participants, like Julie Shaffer, Projects Manager for Sustainable Emory’s Food Service, commented on how informative and empowering the presentations were. Shaffer said:

“It was very inspiring to see others who are breaking new ground in the ‘good food’ movement. It was such a pleasure to hear stories about the creative work colleges and universities are doing across the state, in the area of sustainable food. Momentum for this movement is growing, and it’s very exciting!”

I believe this was the necessary guidance needed to drive sustainable food initiatives forward on Georgia university campuses. In the next year, my plan is to organize strategic planning meetings with students, administrators, and university dining staff together to brainstorm how to tailor this new venture to their individual campuses.