Browsed by
Category: 9 Elements of a Sustainable Campus

Interpretation

Interpretation

Comments 0 Comment

His first guideline for creating “evocative interpretation” is to “ask relevant questions”.  Imagine yourself as a visitor to UNE and develop some questions that you think would evoke an interest in you to learn more about the sustainability at UNE.

When I was visiting UNE for the first time, I was interested in neuroscience. But I quickly became interested in the environment once I realized its importance in my and everybody’s lives. Questions relevant to my first visit had to do with the Arts and Science department, specifically neuroscience and anatomy. But with questions answered in such a way where sustainability was relevant to my major really had me interested. My interpretation of these answers had me wondering more about sustainability. Thomashow’s evocative interpretation is challenging for sustainability interpreters to “encourage those responses in informal settings” (177). Good sustainability questions framed relevant to people’s majors or experience such as what sustainability initiatives will make a student’s life easier and less expensive, or how their major fits into our school’s theme, “innovation for a healthier planet”.

Dr. Thomashow’s fifth guideline is to “balance the visceral and the virtual”.  What does he mean by this?  Give some examples of how we might do that with the creative project in this class?

To “balance the visceral and the virtual,” means to incorporate the biosphere and natural world around us with technology to create an interpretive experience.

UNE does this with quite a few things, and there’s no end for what you can do to accomplish this. Some examples of existing interpretive experiences include the signs around sustainable initiatives, the sustainability blog, and the energy TVs in the commons and marine science center.

But other way that sustainability can be portrayed interpretively though technology (in balance with the viceral world) may be to map the campus’ trees as a campus arboretum, inclusive too, possibly of the campus’ edible plants inititive.

My group is proposing electric landscpaing equipment for the grounds department on campus. This inititive would help us achieve the carbon neutrality goal as well as increase our sustainability on campus. This proposal can be “viscerally and virtually” portrayed using graphs and videos, as well as other case studies.

Governance

Governance

Comments 0 Comment

On page 76, of all the qualities listed there, which do you most value in your university president and why?

A university president should above all be responsive to students, faculty, and administration. While being accountable and transparent about issues on campus is also extremely important, without the assurance that the president will respond thoughtfully to a request or question, how can anyone be confident that change, when needed, will happen.

Responsiveness is essential to campus initiatives because it allows the flow of ideas of campus sustainability and action to take place. While a president may have all the ideas for how to successfully transform a campus, community inclusion is critical for true success, as success is a collective opinion on a campus. While some groups on campus may feel that increasing campus sustainability is the goal, others may also be concerned for the university’s income and expenses. Thus responding to the concerns of other on campus ensures a higher success rate of change.

Dr. Thomashow uses the word Anthropocene.  What is your understanding/interpretation of the word and what implications do you think it represents?

The Anthropocene is a time era, in which we are currently living, where humans have dominated the globe, changing the dynamics of the natural world. Since humans had learned that they have the ability to alter the land around them to suit our needs, there has been a continuous cycle of misuse and manipulation towards the planet. Regardless if this ability was a conscious knowledge, this implies humans also have the ability to change the planet for the better.

While humans have been better known for exploiting the land and resources the earth provides, the antithesis of this statement implies that humans have the full capacity to utilize the planets finite resources in a sustainable way. The Anthropocene may connotate some negative characteristics, it also allows humans the opportunity to bring positivity to it as well.

What leadership qualities can you exhibit to spark transformational change?

One of the most inspiring qualities in a person is passion. Passionate people have a way at pulling the strings in peoples hearts and spreading the desire for change. Leaders with passion for their goals, whatever they may be, often have a better chance at encouraging participation from the community in effecting change. Motivation, similar to passion, proves to others how serious not only this issue is, but how serious the leader is about solving it. Without the motivation to start a project and complete it, change can’t happen, simple as that.

While passion is important, to truly spark transformational change, a leader needs to have clear goals and reasoning for these. A leader needs to convince others that change must occur, and that cannot happen if the people don’t know why it needs to happen or should happen. With good reasoning, planning, and management of the goals intended for change, it is easy for people to get behind a cause. I guess this can be summed up to a leader’s understanding of people’s problems day-to-day on campus, or anywhere.

What dichotomies do you most relate to on pages 95-99 and why?

On campus, I have great responsibility within the Honeybee Conservation Club, and some in the Sustainability Office. Throughout my time working in these areas, I have realized that pushing events to happen, or changes to occur can be harder when there isn’t collective feelings of motivation and interest. Responsibility and authority are dichotomous jobs a person in leadership ought to have simultaneously. When making decisions for the Bee Club, I think it’s my responsibility to collaborate as much as possible with the other board members. But sometimes, deadlines creep up on us, and someone needs to make a decision, which is where authority plays an important role. While concerting everything the club does may seem ideal, it can be tricky when not everyone is on the same page or has enough time.

Timing and finesse are both also important when governing change. Timing is everything, but without a clear plan on how to convince the people needing convincing, timing is negligible. I have realized that ideas are fantastic, and especially when they arise when needed. But often those ideas need someone to enact them. Without the finesse, without the action, these ideas probably won’t happen.

What questions remain for you about university governance specifically, or leadership in general, after reading this chapter?  How might you find the answers to your questions?

This chapter focused a lot on the faculty and administration’s ability to bring change on a campus. But is it just as easy for students to do the same? I hear all the time about things students would ‘love to change,’ but when it comes down to it, no one thinks they can do it. Is that true?

The president of the University of New England has fantastic responsiveness and accountability. I have heard that he is welcome to students detailing dilemmas on campus, and is willing to help out. I suppose he would be a good person to talk with. Also, upper classmen of universities who have invoked transformational change may have fantastic advice.

Materials

Materials

Comments 0 Comment

Watch The Story of Stuff (21 minutes): http://storyofstuff.org/movies/story-of-stuff/ and provide your reaction.

This video perfectly sums up the issues we face today with production and consumption. The society we live in today so easily throws away tons of junk and ends up buying more which is probably unnecessary. I was shocked to find out that there is actual terminology for the things we buy and throw out: intentional and perceived obsolescence. Intentional obsolescence refers to the things we buy that was produced to only last a certain amount of time before it breaks or needs to be replaced while still maintain the trust of the consumer. I feel as though if more consumers were informed on this market trick, maybe we would be more conscious of the cheap crap we buy. Perceived obsolescence refers to the changing styles of items like clothing, shoes, and furniture that convince people they need to update their things. This is an unfortunate consumerist occurrence which greatly contributes to the whole market system, hence why it is difficult to curb.

The speaker in the video mentions a ‘closed loop production’ cycle, a concept nearly opposite of the production cycle described in the video. Resources we take from the planet need to be regenerated before we keep extracting them. And the labor we drain from the poorest people on the planet needs to be given the value it deserves, otherwise society will be stuck in this loop of consume and toss.

Evaluate your feelings about the conflict between the consumer economy and environmental sustainability.  How do you feel about the idea that to be a good environmental steward means going “without”?

The consumer economy an environmental sustainability butt heads in many aspects of production of goods and disposal of waste. Truthfully, it is almost impossible for both to coexist peacefully without totally reinventing the consumerist economy over-exploiting the Earth’s resources to nothing.

I have felt for a long time that we buy ore thanwe need. The essentials of what we need are food, clothing, and shelter, and everything else is an added bonus, usually for embracing individuality. Going ‘without’ certain items would be perfectly fine with me, seeing that humans lasted just fine without many of the things we have today.

A good environmental steward should be conscious of what he or she consumes, as there are finite resources on the planet and there has to be enough for everyone, today, tomorrow, and then rest of the planet’s existence. It is almost like going to a party. When you’re a guest, you don’t want to be rude and eat all the food they brought out yourself. Instead, you take what you need so the rest of the guests can enjoy the party. It’s the same for the planet.

How might UNE’s maker space be a place of “ethically sustainable innovation”?

The University’s maker space is where students can bring their ideas into reality. Here, students can build prototypes and models of their ideas, or even build them fully. This unique spot on campus is where innovation and creativity is found, which makes it an ideal space to experiment with ideas which could benefit the environment.

What materials do you interact with on a daily basis that you would want to be “green” here at UNE?

  • furniture (desks, chairs, tables, couches, etc.)
  • bathrooms (paper towels, toilet paper, etc.)
  • clothing
  • paper, pencils, pens
  • food
  • computers

What happens to your “stuff” that gets thrown away here on campus?

From the minute I put my ‘stuff’ in the garbage can anywhere on campus, I send it on a journey. First, it gets brought to a dumpster, where a garbage truck will eventually come to clean it out. That gargage truck will bring the trask from the University to EcoMaine, a trash incinerator. Once dumped at EcoMaine, this garbage gets incinerated in a large building. But after incineration, my trash is now a combination of chemicals, smoke, and GHGs which gets emitted into the atmosphere. EcoMaine, however, uses some of the emissions to generate electricity.

What “uh-oh” moments did you encounter when reading this chapter?

Reading this chapter, I became increasingly scared to think about the future of our society. Like the woman from the video said, we aren’t the dreamers for trying to change society for the sake of the planet; if anything, we are the realists actually trying to make sure there’s a future for our children. The rate we consume materials, especially in the United States is both unreasonable and unimaginable. Living in this country, we have been conditioned to believe all these items will be available to us anytime. But this has led us to take for granted the very fact that we can go to store and buy exactly what we need. I look around at all my friends and family, even myself often times, purchasing items for the sake of buying them. This unsustainable habit, having started within the last 200 years, is what will drive humans to oblivion.

css.php