Wellesley '57

Class of 1957 Green Fund - Interim Report for FY 2017

The Class of 1957 is a key source of support for the College’s sustainability-related activities. This interim report presents the activities the Green Fund supported during the current academic year, plans for the next academic year, and also, other sustainability-related activities being pursued.

Sustainability-related Activities around the College

Wellesley College has adopted an ambitious Sustainability Plan, and has established a clear road map towards improving the sustainability performance. The plan focuses on eight sectors: academic & co-curricular activities, buildings, climate & energy, food & dining, landscape & watershed, purchasing & waste, transportation, and water. The Sustainability Committee, Paulson Ecology of Place Initiative team, Environmental Science faculty and Facilities Department are working together to implement the Sustainability Plan. Highlights of activities conducted during the current academic year follow:

• The 2018 academic year has been declared the Year of Sustainability. Several events are being planned to celebrate the Year and increase awareness. The faculty is considering avenues to integrate sustainability into the curriculum. The major goal of the Year of Sustainability is to engage in a campus-wide discussion of sustainability and ultimately to define what sustainability means for Wellesley College going forward.

• A number of student-led initiatives have been funded by the Green Fund, and have helped increase awareness (details follow).

• To promote adaptive re-use of buildings, conservation studies are being conducted to preserve historical significance of buildings slated for renovation. A study for Jewett Arts Center has been completed, and a study for the L-Wing of the Science Center is beginning.

• Facilities condition assessments of buildings have been completed. Now, we have a detailed master list of all deferred maintenance needs in each of our buildings. Trustees are discussing options to fund the deferred and ongoing maintenance needs.

• A building by building energy use assessment is in progress, and will be completed this summer. Once the energy conservation measures have been identified and prioritized, we will begin improving the energy efficiency of our buildings. At the same time, meters to measure energy consumption will be installed and the data will be displayed in a dashboard format which will allow the data to be quickly interpreted on an on-going basis.

• A pilot program has been launched to take timely actions to correct faults in the HVAC and lighting systems, so that optimal use of energy and user comfort can be ensured.

• Strategic planning related to the cogeneration, boiler and chiller plant is in progress, and will be completed this summer. The goal is to improve plant efficiencies, so that the campus’s carbon footprint can be reduced.

• Our new Paulson Ecology of Place Initiative will improve our landscape and watershed management. The College plans to review the Landscape Master Plan during the next academic year and evaluate how to improve landscape and watershed management performance. The director of the Paulson Initiative, Dr. Suzanne Langridge, starts in July 2017.

• The Sustainability Committee is prioritizing the targets established in the Sustainability Plan so that the College can focus limited resources better.

• The Sustainability Committee has been working with faculty directors from the Babson/Olin/Wellesley Sustainability Certificate Program to increase awareness and enrollment in the Program.

Activities Supported by Green Fund in 2017 Academic Year

The Class of 1957 Green Fund has supported a number of work-study programs and student projects. Six interns have helped connect with their peers, faculty, and staff on sustainable behavioral change campaigns. In this report, you will hear directly from our students regarding their activities and future plans.

Sustainability Education and Awareness Events

Kelly Zimmerhanzel ’17 – Save Ohno Program

This year as a special student-driven campaign, we tried a virtual online game called Save Ohno. This game allows users to gain points by completing environmentally-conscious actions daily to eventually save their virtual grand-daughter, Ohno, from a bleak future. The overall thought behind the game is to ingrain into students' minds that their actions matter for future generations. We designed these actions for the student-specific environment at Wellesley and worked with a non-profit organization that specializes in behavioral change through online games. Wellesley-specific actions included signing online petitions, attending events in the area, and completing short quizzes about the Sustainability Plan, the PV panels on campus and the locations for recycling bins. The goal of the competition is to increase environmental awareness and empower competitors with the knowledge that their daily actions can make a difference in improving the environment.

I have largely been focusing on recruiting teams for the Save Ohno competition that is currently happening. The competition has involved 256 Wellesley students from various organizations across campus, giving this competition a wider reach than any previous sustainability initiative. Second, the competition has been successful in attracting a larger number and wider array of students to sustainability events, thereby increasing their awareness of sustainability initiatives on campus. Finally, the competition has assisted the Office of Sustainability by increasing participation in existing initiatives and making new initiatives successful. More than thirty students have signed up to receive a Sustainable Living Certification as a result of the competition. In addition, fifty books were donated to the Textbook Lending Library, an initiative that was previously unsuccessful due to a lack of donations by students. Thus, Save Ohno has already made a positive impact in many ways and I am sure the results will be even more positive when they are assessed at the end of the competition.

Ella Mullikin ’20 – Save Ohno Program

Currently, I am in charge of the actions and customizations component of the Save Ohno campaign, which is related to my larger focus on behavior change at Wellesley. I also helped to recalculate Wellesley’s diversion rate, taking into account our impressive management of yard waste. Next year, I hope to dedicate more time to changing student perceptions and behavior around recycling, hopefully in part by influencing the way recycling is handled and presented by the College. We are planning to start a recycling competition among the residential halls as part of the Year of Sustainability. We find that competitions have worked in motivating students to recycle more effectively. We'll be providing them with a tote bag in which they collect cans, paper, and plastics so that they don't get trashed in the desk side bins.

Nina-Marie Amadeo ’18 – Sustainability Awareness

I have been largely in charge of building a website for the Year of Sustainability that is going to serve as a portal for all events, actions, and initiatives planned for that year. I am a Computer Science major and find it rewarding to help the Office in posting sustainability-related content and keeping the community informed of the work we are doing. We also have a Facebook page that we use to message our community gatherings at El Table. They are so important to replenish our pool of environmentally inclined students all year around. For the Year of Sustainability, we are planning to host many of these dinners to increase a much needed discussion about the future of sustainability on our campus and what we students think this vision should look like in the next years.

Sustainable Office and Living Certification

Sarah Kain ’20 - Sustainable Workspace Certification

Currently, as an intern at the Office, I run the Sustainable Workspace Certification program. This program allows faculty and staff (from professors to office assistants) to learn and implement simple ways to include sustainable practices in their everyday lives and office spaces. Faculty and staff sign up for an appointment with me and I meet with them to discuss 11 criteria (plus 5 bonus actions) that the Office has determined are necessary for a sustainable workspace. These range from using a reusable water bottle instead of disposable ones, to discussing offsetting carbon emissions. This semester alone, I have certified over 30 faculty/staff workspaces as sustainable, ranging from the Religion Department to the Controller's office. I would also like to expand my position to act as a student liaison between faculty/staff and the Office of Sustainability, collecting ideas that can improve the overall sustainability of the campus. For example, Amy Banzeart, the engineering professor, has amazing ideas for sustainability in the Science Center, including a rack for recycled engineering parts that art students could use in their projects. I would like to continue this work in the effort to have every department on campus be certified as an attainable goal for the Year of Sustainability.

Eco-Rep Program in Residential Halls

Sarah McBride ’18 – Eco Rep Program Coordinator

Currently I am coordinating the Eco-Rep program in the residential halls, which entails holding meetings, planning projects, and distributing prizes. For the Year of Sustainability, I am hoping to expand the program into all residential halls so that we can scale the Green Living Certification Program and reach every student with our mission. We noticed that we can reach more students with running online campaigns like we did with SaveOhno and it would be great to see a re-run of the competition with the incoming first-years.

Bike Share Program

Hazel Leung ’20 – Bike Share Intern

As the Bike Share intern, I currently work to maintain the Bike Share system on campus.  The Bike Share system currently serves over 900 members of the Wellesley community. Many students rely on the bikes to commute to off-campus jobs; the system is completely free for any member of the College community to use. Next year, I hope to promote the usage of bikes on campus even more (both Bike Share bikes and non-Bike Share bikes). Some possible ideas include a bike-powered smoothie maker and free bike repair workshops for students.

FY 2017 and Beyond

The current academic year has been a year of transition. We have begun shifting the focus towards improving the sustainability performance in all of the eight sectors of the Sustainability Plan. This year, the College has invested more than $700,000 to understand the long-deferred needs in our buildings. We are working on financial plans that would allow the College to fund the several millions of dollars needed to improve sustainability performance.

The Green Fund is extremely important to the College. The Fund has been used to support student-led programs, and we will continue that program. To use the Green Fund even more effectively, we are considering several programs for the next academic year. These include:

• Continue supporting the student-led awareness and activities currently in progress.

• Expand the internship program to support energy efficiency and waste minimization programs.

• Expand Fund support to all interested students: Fund projects proposed by individual students or student groups. We plan to invite proposals at the beginning of academic year and fund as many proposals as possible.

• Use funds to procure recycling bins to improve recycling efforts.

We look forward to hearing suggestions from the Class of 1957 as we explore new opportunities to use the Green Fund.

 

The Office of Sustainability concludes a successful year with a lot of projects under our belt with help of our busy interns (from left to right): Ella Mullikin ’20 (Recycling), Kelly Zimmerhanzel ’17 (Sustainable Food), Sarah McBride ’18 (Eco-Rep Coordinator and Student representative on the Sustainability Committee), Sarah Kain ’20 (Green Office Certifications), Dorothea Von Herder (Office of Sustainability), Hazel Leung ’20 (Bike Share and new President of EnAct, a new environmental action student organization), Rachel Korkodilos ’20 (new President of EnAct).    Patrick Willoughby, Director of Sustainability