Hiring GAs

On Friday we had the first round of interviews for the Graduate Assistant positions that will be funded by the student sustainability fee. These GAs will work with the campus Sustainability Coordinator & SustainaReps to bring in grants, identify opportunities, and to help the students, staff, and faculty at the University of Missouri move to more environmentally sustainable choices.

The group doing the hiring was comprised of 3 staff, 1 faculty, and 5 students. The students represented 3 of the major environmental sustainability groups at the University of Missouri: Greeks Going Green, Weatherization Columbia, and Sustain Mizzou. This fact, in and of itself, really excites me. There has been a lot of talk recently about the environmental sustainability movement at Mizzou and how it will work and interact with campus. People have talked about a holistic movement that encompasses not only staff and administrators, but students and faculty as well. We have heard from administration that students must be a large part of this movement or it will not be possible. On Friday we had the first evidence that being true to form. We had more students at a job hiring for the university then there were staff. Our voice is not only being recognized but looked to and accepted. We are beginning to see the effects of the student movement on campus and how we can become influential in our campuses sustainability.

By the end of this week we will have those two graduate positions filled and they will begin working sometime after July 1. SustainaReps (undergrads) will be hired sometime over the summer or early Fall semester. By September/October we will have 8 students working to make our campus more sustainable.

GA Job Description

Position Opening: Graduate Research Assistant

Campus Facilities-Sustainability Department

University of Missouri

Summary: The candidate(s) will be charged with assisting in the implementation of the new Campus Facilities Sustainability department. The candidate(s) will work closely with MU students and campus administration to expand the University of Missouri’s sustainability efforts that are either underway or to be undertaken in the future. This position will focus on environmental sustainability efforts that impact students, and will work largely in educating the student population about environmental sustainability issues through direct communication, events, and other programming efforts. The candidate(s) will work extensively with the MSA Sustainability Committee, student sustainability organizations, the Sustainability Coordinator, the Environmental Affairs and Sustainability Committee, Campus Facilities, and other departments, as well as the broader campus community, to develop and implement campus sustainability initiatives.

Job duties: The Graduate Assistant(s) will work directly with the student population, the SustainaReps, the MSA Sustainability Committee, the Sustainability Coordinator, and the Environmental Affairs and Sustainability Committee to identify, coordinate, and support existing programs, develop communication strategies in support of campus sustainability, and identify new sustainability initiatives throughout the campus.

• Assist in the oversight and management of the Student Sustainability Fee
• Track student interest in and knowledge of environmental sustainability in order to monitor the effectiveness of ongoing sustainability education efforts.
• Manage and supervise a paid student staff of up to 6 individuals (“SustainaReps”)
• Communicate and collaborate with MU students working on sustainability ideas and programs
• Help explore the feasibility of new environmental sustainability initiatives on campus and research sustainability initiatives both at the University and other Universities across the country
• Provide leadership, education, and inspiration to the MU community regarding actions that can be taken to help the campus become more environmentally sustainable
• Promote and market sustainability initiatives to students and the broader campus community
• Identify and implement projects, measure results, and collect data for communication that will help keep students, faculty and staff knowledgeable about campus sustainability actions
• Help to perform audits of campus energy use and solid waste generation, showing savings of sustainability initiatives and make recommendations for improvements
• Seek grant-writing and other funding opportunities to support expanded sustainability efforts

Qualifications:

Previous experience in program design and administration, together with knowledge and commitment to environmental sustainability is desired. Successful candidates will need strong analytical, communication and organization skills; the ability to work independently under specific deadlines; presentation skills and previous sustainability programming skills desired.

Compensation:

• .50 FTE position. 9, 10 or 12 month position available, 20 hours/week
• $13,000 annual salary (based on 12 month position), payable monthly or bi-weekly
• Tuition Fee Waiver anticipated (pending approval of MU Graduate School)

To apply, email your resume and cover letter to Dr. Mark Lucas, Director of Student Life, 2500 MU Student Center. LucasM@missouri.edu For additional information, call 882-3621

Deadline for application: May 22, 2009. Anticipated Start Date: July 1, 2009

The Numbers

The voting numbers for the referendum:

Graduate Student Results

Sustainability: 68% YES

32% NO

Undergraduate Student Results

Sustainability: 82% YES

18% NO

Combined Results

Sustainability: 80% YES

20% NO

There were a total of around 2200 undergrads and 550 grads who voted in the referendum. That comes to about 9.1% of campus (currently there are 30,200 students enrolled at Mizzou).

Mass Email

Another great way to get the word out about a fee is campus mass emails. Mizzou has a weekly email that goes out to everyone on campus that lists information and events going on around campus. We were able to get at the very top of the list the week the vote took place. It cost $50, but it was one of the most effective marketing tools, so completely worth it.

Vote YES on Sustainability

Today, ending at 6pm, is your last chance to vote on the Student Sustainability Fee! This $1 fee will enable student focused education programming, advocacy, and outreach. You can vote NOW at vote.missouri.edu!! This Fee WILL: -Only cost $1 per student per semester; -Provide jobs for 8 students on the MU campus; -Gather the opinions of students about sustainability issues; -Be used to educate students about sustainability; -Be used to research sustainability initiatives; -Be used to bring grants to Mizzou. This Fee WILL NOT: -Increase student fees at all, we will still receive a 34 cent decrease; -Pay for, or directly support, a sustainability coordinator; -Be used to pay any student organization on campus.

Announcement sponsored by Sustain Mizzou

Editorials

One great way to advertise for a fee is through the student newspaper. I wrote an opinion editorial that was published a few days before the vote actually occurred.

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Over the past few years Mizzou has seen with more frequent occurrence the issue of environmental sustainability come up on campus, with students implementing new projects and education campaigns, departments adopting new policies and even our campus administration signing the Presidents Climate Commitment. The newest issue to come up on campus is a student vote, next Monday through Wednesday, on a new sustainability fee of $1. It’s a small amount, but this fee will do a lot for the campus community.

But what is “sustainability” and what is this fee going to do for the students of Mizzou anyway?

Sustainability can be defined as meeting the needs of the present while still allowing future generations to meet their own needs. Factors of sustainability include resource conservation, waste management and renewable energy. One of the most recognizable symbols of sustainability is the chasing arrows that represent the three Rs: reduce, reuse, recycle. Campuses across the nation are implementing sustainability programs that produce cost-savings and help reduce their campuses impact on the environment.

On our campus we do a pretty good job of No. 3, recycle. We have a recycling coordinator who has placed recycling bins in a large majority of campus buildings. Most of us know that plastics one and two, aluminum and glass are the types of beverages that can be recycled in Columbia. We even have a stellar cardboard recycling program on campus, having placed eleventh in the cardboard recycling bracket of the RecycleMania competition last year.

So what are we doing about reducing waste and re-using our resources? Our energy management department has done a phenomenal job of reducing campus energy consumption as the campus as grown over the last 20 years, but is that all? Can’t we do more? How?

Well, students can start by passing the sustainability fee coming up this Monday. The fee is only $1 per student per semester, and each dollar will be used to bring sustainability initiatives, programming and education to the Mizzou campus. We will be able to hire eight student workers: two graduate assistants and six undergraduate “SustainaReps.” These students will be tasked with researching sustainability initiatives, starting new education programs and applying for funding and grants to create a more sustainable Mizzou.

Remember that whole trayless dinning issue, where trays would be removed from dining halls to encourage students to waste less food? Did you have a strong opinion on it and not know where to voice that opinion? Well, these students would poll the student body on potential programs and figure out what the students of Mizzou would like to see, then work with campus administration to see those programs come to fruition. One of their main jobs would be advocating for the cost-savings of those programs to go straight back to the students who supported it: your pockets.

This coming Monday, Feb. 9, starting at 6 p.m. you will be able to make a positive change on Mizzou’s campus by creating this new fee. Thanks to an overall decrease in student fees this year, if we approve this new fee our student fees will still decrease by 34 cents. Let’s make a choice as a student body to create a more sustainable atmosphere on campus and start reducing our resource consumption through student efforts. Let’s vote YES for sustainability!

Patrick Margherio

President, Sustain Mizzou

PatrickMargherio@mizzou.edu

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Additionally, it really helps when others support you as well. You can’t count on this to happen but it is nice when it does. This is an editorial written by the Maneater editorial board about the fee.

In Monday’s Missouri Students Association student fee referendum, students will have the option to add a $1 sustainability fee to their university bills. The proposed fee is an initiative that’s gotten on the ballot thanks to the dedication of students, which we think is awesome.

The dollar being added to the ballot won’t even raise total student — in fact, they are being lowered overall.

Sustainability is a hot topic right now, as it should be with a suffering planet and a suffering economy. It’s important to construct a focused group of people to identify issues where sustainability can be improved or implemented and really communicate these issues with administration and help to carry out current and future plans surrounding this issue.

The money for the sustainable measures that should be implemented will not only create a greener campus, but also a more cost-effective one.

It’s important the university administration realize students have gone to all this work to save the school money and make it a better environment.

Once the university’s finances are more stable, we’d like to see the university kicking some funds into this project. Students will, in essence, be paying a dollar in an effort to save the university some cash. Maybe later on, the university could consider matching the student funds to keep sustainable innovation going strong.

The inevitable questions and comments

There will, of course, always be people who question your sustainability as you lobby for a sustainability fee. Below is an email we received and my responses to it.

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Email:

I felt the need to comment:
There is a guy standing outside Ellis passing out fliers reminding people to vote on the sustainability referendum– people are looking at them and promptly throwing them away.
Isn’t this counterproductive for both your organization and the environment? Why not just make a posterboard or have a friendly person asking people to vote? It’s free and makes a bigger impression than a piece of paper. And we all have email. People who care enough to vote on this sort of thing are probably the same people who read the emails sent on your behalf.
Anyway, I appreciate what you all do. Thanks.

My Response:

Thanks for your concern. We actually agree that it is a little wasteful to be handing out flyers.

We decided though, that this vote and the potential it has to greatly increase sustainability, and specifically waste reduction, on campus is worth the minor amount of waste we will generate with these flyers. We did do our best to decrease the flyer impact as much as we could by using 100% recycled paper and printing 4 flyers to a page.

We are also doing email and facebook advertising, but we didn’t want to limit ourselves from missing out on any possible advertising.

While you may not agree with our approach I hope you can understand the thought we put in before deciding to take this action and understand we did it with the best intentions.

Thanks for your email
Patrick

MSA Legislation

For our sustainability fee we wanted to do a student referendum to show actual student support for the creation of this fee (plus if you create a new fee you have to have a referendum according to our student government bylaws).  I linked to the different pieces of legislation that we had to pass through the student senate in order to create our referendum, have the vote, and then establish the fee.

Encouraging a Coordinator

Establishing Referendum

Establishing Wording

Establishing Fee

•

Sustainability Fee & Coordinator Research

All the attached files were found mainly through the AASHE website. These were mainly used to justify a sustainability fee and others were used to justify a sustainability coordinator position on campus.

Sustainability

environmental-center-2005-2006-budget-request-highlights

efssalarysurvey2005

eerwgfinalreport

eco-reps

cuimprovementinitiativeform

creating-and-environmental-coordinator-position-highlights

creating-and-environmental-coordinator-position

2006_sustainability_proposal_summary

2006_sustainability_proposal

2005_sustainability_proposal

environmental-center-2005-2006-budget-request

This is a great study done by researchers at the College of William and Mary that shows the dramatic increase in student sustainability practices when campuses actively work on and promote sustainability: william-mary-study-climate-change

Presentation for Show Me Sustainability Conference

On Saturday I will be presenting a workshop at the Show Me Sustainability Conference hosted by Sustain Mizzou at the University of Missouri. The workshop will focus on the Sustainability Fee that was recently passed at Mizzou and how we were able to do it.

My abstract is:

“Running a student sustainability fee campaign on  less than $100″
MU student body recently voted to approve a $1 per
student per semester sustainability fee. In this work-
shop we will go through the approach taken, how to
build support, and where to invest your time, money,
and energy for the best approach, all  for under $100.

My next few posts are going to be about the fee and will include research and documents that I have on the fee. Check back over the next 24 hours for all the information I can find and format.

Why I’m in Sustain Mizzou

The next issue of mizzou magazine is going to be focused on sustainability at the MU campus. There are a few stories about Sustain Mizzou or Sustain Mizzou related activities in the issue and I have been working a lot with their writers to connect them with various people in the organization. They gave me an opportunity this past week to write a 200 word narrative about why I am in Sustain Mizzou, and for those of you who are in Sustain Mizzou or are familure with our group, probably realize that this is really really hard. I couldn’t really nail down the best approach to it so I wrote the following:

It is really hard to explain my relationship with Sustain Mizzou, and specifically why I am in it, because of how much I would have to tell you.

I would have to explain how and why my experiences before college led me to join Sustain Mizzou and what I have learned about myself since.

I would have to show all the different ways it allowed me to get involved on campus.

I would have to go into detail about each of our 14 projects individually and how each gave me some new piece of knowledge or insight I could apply to my life.

I would have to list each person I connected with and how much I have learned from each of them.

I would have to talk about the thousands of students, faculty, and staff that I was able to educate about sustainability, and the effect that has had at Mizzou.

I would have to tell you too much to fit in this narrative, so I will have to define my relationship in the simplest terms.

I joined Sustain Mizzou because of my interest in the environment. I stayed in Sustain Mizzou because of what it taught me. I love Sustain Mizzou because of the opportunities it provides me to make a difference.

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With any luck, this or something similar, depending on how badly the editors tear it apart, will show up on the Mizzou Magazine website in the next week or two.