the UW Sustainability blog
You may not have noticed, but as you walk around the UW campus more of those plants and flowers at your feet are species native to Puget Sound.
That’s because UW’s Society for Ecology Restoration student guild (SER-UW) native plant nursery has been working to restore areas on campus by increasing native species biodiversity and creating open spaces for students to engage with the natural world just steps from their residence halls.
When his friends were buying cars, UW student Scott Calvert was busy saving money for a better bike.
It's a passion he's sharing with UW by working at the ASUW bike shop - a hub for the UW biking community that's detailed in this video.
Photo courtesy of Meili Powell, Tali Haller, Dana Chapman, and Mikayla Richardson
Last spring, a group of UW students traveled more than 200 miles to help teach three sixth grade classes about the environment.
"Our overarching goal was to perpetuate love for the environment, but also teach kids how to affect change on the local level," said Tali Haller, one of the UW student teachers.
On May 19-21 EcoReps hosted the annual Green Greek Competition, a contest aimed at educating the Greek Community about sustainability and helping chapters go green. The EcoReps group set up tables on the median of 17th Avenue with activities designed to promote sustainable behaviors within the community. During the three days Greek members could participate in games such as a minute-to-win-it waste sorting challenge, trivia, and recycling basketball.
A refined Chevy Malibu sits in the far corner of the UW EcoCAR lab as a reminder of UW’s second place finish last year in the three-year automotive engineering EcoCAR2 competition sponsored by General Motors.
The EcoCAR group is hoping to match that success in the current EcoCAR3 competition, a four-year process to redesign a Chevrolet Camaro to be as energy efficient as possible while keeping its performance.
Students: Are you interested in sustainable science and engineering? Do you want to network with professionals in this field? If so, please help launch the International Institute for Sustainable Laboratories (I2SL) UW Student Chapter on Wednesday, May 20, from 5-6 p.m. in Allen Research Commons Room Red C.
If you want to enjoy fresh, campus-grown produce all summer long, sign up for a UW Farm Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) share!
Hanging in Poplar Hall is a Lucid Energy Dashboard to remind students how much energy and water they are using. This same dashboard hangs in all the West Campus dorms, something one student group is very proud of.
The dashboards allow students to see how their building is performing compared to the others, which encourages conservation. The displays are one reminder of a larger sustainability culture in the residence halls, a culture Students Expressing Environmental Dedication (SEED) is working to encourage.
Photo: (Left) Co-creator of ReThink Will Fantle and (Right) Vice President Gracie Dahl
A trip to Israel sparked a UW student's dream to leave a mark on the environment.
"There was a full moon, a massive brilliant orb, and stars everywhere,” said Will Fantle, co-creator of ReThink, a UW club focused on business sustainability. “They took us out in silence and told us to go find a spot in the desert. We sat out there for what felt like hours. I just lay there looking up at the stars thinking about what I wanted to do with my life."
This spring, EcoReps Coordinator Merrick Calder and Green Greek Coordinator Kiyomi Morris both were given the opportunity to present the Excellence in Environmental Awareness awards to the top green houses in the greek community as part of the 2015 Greek Excellence Awards. The winners were Alpha Delta Pi, Kappa Delta, Sigma Kappa, and Zeta Tau Alpha.