Office of Sustainability and Student Groups Meet to Connect Efforts

The Office of Sustainability and student sustainability leaders from across Columbia met together to identify opportunities for partnership. During the meeting, students shared each group’s initiatives, discussed challenges in advocating for sustainability on campus, and explored areas of collaboration between the Office of Sustainability and student groups going forward.

Student representatives included Sunrise Columbia, Build it Green, the Student Union for Sustainable Development, People of the Environment, American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists of Columbia University, Sustainability Management Student Association, the Green Business Club, SproutUp, and the Engineering Council.

Identifying challenges and solutions for collaboration

Students shared common challenges that groups face in maintaining momentum year over year on initiatives. A central, but natural difficulty that surfaced is maintaining institutional memory, as students cycle in and out of Columbia, making it hard to pass on knowledge about club leadership and to sustain faculty relationships. Additionally, some clubs become inactive from one year to the next, confusing outreach and collaboration between operational clubs. A proposed solution is creating a process for sustainability clubs to self-identify using an open-access form, so other students can see what clubs are active. The Office of Sustainability offered to create a landing page for this on the website.

Another common issue is the visibility and competition for student group engagement. One way to address this is to host a student sustainability club fair at the beginning of the school year, exposing incoming students to the wide array of opportunities available from climate justice or green infrastructure, to environmental literature. The student leaders and the Office will look to collaborate on this next fall.

Additionally, some students voiced concern about an over-saturation of activities on campus, with many sustainability groups trying to achieve the same goals and hosting similar events, while unaware of other groups doing the same. Continued meetings between student groups and the Office of Sustainability will aim to create opportunities for consensus. The group also brainstormed a potential Earth Day event where all clubs could work together to help align mission and goals, and where the Office of Sustainability could showcase Columbia’s progress and plans to date.  

Opportunities for further student involvement

This gathering demonstrated the importance of students and administrators sharing collective sustainability aspirations for Columbia and to problem-solve on challenges to achieving these goals. Student sustainability leaders interested in being involved, should self-identify their student group to be included in these upcoming activities. 

- Gillian Lindahl Murphy for the Student Union for Sustainable Development and Sunrise; Office of the Sustainability