WARNING: about to geek out really hard. Beware.
It is already pretty impressive when I get to explain to people what I do here at the Sustainability Office on Campus. I can rave for hours about how great it is to be working in a field that is legitimately connected to my field of study- how applicable what I learn in the classroom is to my some of the projects I am working on here at the office. Beware, I am about to go on one of those tangents… concerning the Sustainable Development Committee (SUDCOM) at the University of Ottawa.
The committee is comprised of three faculty, five admin staff, two students, and two community members and its role is to provide advice and insight to uOttawa’s Administrative Committee on matters related to best practices and socially responsible behaviour. This boils down to being a committee of persons who seek to make our campus green.
The first meeting took place during reading week and went really well—luckily for myself, being that I had spent the last portion of the summer attempting to recruit members who seemed most adequate for the task. It proved difficult at times but I am happy with the end result and they all seem excited and enthused by the tasks ahead of them.
The committee is going to be setting goals for sustainability themes on campus, some goals already exist but they are reaching the end point of their timeline (2012). Ten themes exist which will have new goals created by the SUDCOM and they are:
Energy, Water, Waste, Food, Greenspace and Buildings, Emissions, Economy, Community, Sustainable Transportation and Curriculum
Personally, I get to help facilitate these meetings that committee members attend, help generate ideas for new five year goals and act as a resource for the working groups that will eventually be created to work on the objectives that will aid in successfully completing these goals. The implementation of projects such as bottled water free, the mechanical composter, and the Upass have been accomplished by the committee in the past. It may be a long, arduous process but in the meantime I get to throw planning terms such as “mixed-scanning approach” that I learned in Natural Resource Management. Huzzah!
-merissa