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Ah-ha: Why sustainability isn’t catching on

Ah-ha: Why sustainability isn’t catching on

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Some times I wonder why sustainable initiatives aren’t always put in place, even when I know that they are extra beneficial in areas other than sustainability. All the pieces finally made sense after talking with the grounds department managers: maybe they have misunderstandings or don’t know enough about sustainability. Talking with Greg and Shawn, both with landscaping background, I realized they didn’t know of many sustainable strategies to minimize energy or water use, or the solid difference between organic and non-organic landscaping. Because of some of their hesitancy, I am rather unsure of the 100% accuracy of some of the STARS fiends under landscape management.

It was fascinating discussing this with these men, as I was almost under the impression that these were strategies they were familiar with. This didn’t turn out to be the case, and I was rather surprised. I anticipated more knowledge being spread about sustainable initiatives to operations like grounds due to its ability to maintain itself better and be more cost effective. It was more of an ah-ha moment because I realize now why an increase in sustainable initiatives hasn’t happened: there isn’t enough awareness and understanding.

Sustainability is having difficulty cathcing on in some places because people aren’t taught well enough the importance and benefits of living a sustainable lifestyle and career. This wasn’t the case, obviously, when talking with environmental professor, Pam Morgan, as she is incredibly familiar with the idea of sustainability. But for those who are not so informed on the subject, it can be difficult to rationalize such changes. It is important to encourage spreading awareness about sustainability to help it progress into other areas of the campus.

Approach to STARS

Approach to STARS

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The STARS reporting system is quite impressive in terms of covering all the sustainability bases. The credits my group was responsible for was Grounds landscape management and biodiversity. I chose these credits because of my past connection to the grounds department as a summer position in 2019. I enjoyed my time in grounds, and I was curious about the sustainability of the department.

Upon beginning this project, I outlined several steps for Lily and myself to accomplish in the coming weeks. These include:

  • Read all credit questions
  • Identify people on campus able to help answer questions
  • Contact these people with their credit questions attached & meet
  • Enter answers on the STARS database

The Asana task tracker was used to organized the progress of completion of our credits by entering these tasks.

I met with my professor, Pam Morgan, for the biodiversity credit during my lab a few weeks ago. She was able to help me with many of the research initiatives taking place on campus which relate to significant species and habitats as well as sustainability and climate change. Pam was very helpful in filling out the STARS report as far as research goes. But there are definitely other research and sustainability initiatives for biodiversity that could be elaborated.

For landscaping, I met with both Greg McKellar and Shawn Descoteaux. They helped me understand the basis of the sustainability of the grounds department, however it wasn’t as sustainable as I would have hoped. Sustainability seemed of lower importance to them, however there were certain sustainable landscaping strategies used that were quite beneficial. Both Greg and Shawn were pretty helpful in obtaining the information for STARS, but I noticed, though, that the grounds department may not have a good understanding of what sustainability entails for landscape management.

The process of finding the information and filling out the STARS database was rewarding, in the sense that I gained experienced searching for information from specific people across campus. I enjoyed learning about the sustainability of grounds, given my history with them, and it has encouraged me to really think about all the sustainable initiatives the grounds can implement.

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