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First-Year Students As Agents of Campus Change

First-Year Students As Agents of Campus Change. Brian Hagenbuch and Dan Morse Pine Lake Institute for Environmental and Sustainability Studies Hartwick College, Oneonta, New York pinelake@hartwick.edu . About Hartwick College.

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First-Year Students As Agents of Campus Change

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  1. First-Year Students As Agents of Campus Change Brian Hagenbuch and Dan Morse Pine Lake Institute for Environmental and Sustainability Studies Hartwick College, Oneonta, New York pinelake@hartwick.edu

  2. About Hartwick College Hartwick College is a private liberal arts college of 1,500 students, located in Oneonta, NY, in the northern foothills of the Catskill Mountains. (20 miles from Cooperstown)

  3. Pine Lake Environmental Campus • 125-acre off site living and learning laboratory • Up to 38 students reside in Lodge, Farmhouse, cabins • Open to any FT Hartwick student • Strawbale House and Cob House • Model sustainable living and learning

  4. Liberal Arts Campus as Laboratory for Sustainability

  5. Idea and Practice of Sustainability • First-year seminar • Students have option of living at Pine Lake • College skills • How things work • Introduce research • Engage in service • Prepare them for academic study • Build community

  6. Why First-Year Students? Personality • Energy and enthusiasm • Young, naïve, impressionable • Ready for challenges • Open to experiential learning opportunities • Explorative majors • Want to make a difference

  7. Why First-Year Students? Academic Perspective • No thesis work yet • Improve process skills (or at least good habits) • Connect to their potential majors

  8. Why First-Year Students Institutional Interest • Create community of peers, improve sense of belonging • Agenda and practice of decreasing waste, reducing cost, improving ecological footprint • Peer leaders • Increase student success Retention

  9. Why First-Year Students? PLI Interest • Experiential Learning • Challenge student assumptions and worldviews • Campus leadership • Agents of Change • Four more years • Alumni donors

  10. Learning Outcomes • Apply the basic principles and methods of sustainability to assess a variety of ecological, economic, and social perspectives • Relate systems theory to a number of issues including food stability, climate change, consumption and waste, and product design • Through problem-based learning undertake acceptable and recognized methods of research, data analysis, and communication to study the key issues • Critically read and evaluate primary and popular literature • Write clear and succinct reports • Present scholarly work through oral presentations and posters • Participate and contribute to the overall dynamics of small groups and the class

  11. Three Challenges (3 F’s) Food Fuel Fiber

  12. What Shall We Eat? • Background: readings, films, reflections • Challenge: How can Hartwick dining produce 2,500 meals per day in a sustainable manner?

  13. Where is the Next Energy Source? Background: Readings, Tours, films Challenge: How will we get around and heat our homes?

  14. How Will We Live? Background: Cradle to Cradle. 2002. Challenge: How can we maintain a quality of life that creates more just, equitable, and sustainable communities?

  15. Campus Sustainability Project • Identify a sustainability project--water, waste, energy, renovations, etc. • Dining and Facilities • Midterm Needs Assessment • Identify problem and need • Final Project: • Grant proposal describing the need and your solution

  16. Project Examples • Composting program with the Commons* • Campus Organic Garden* • Water-saving showerheads in resident halls* • Biodiesel initiative • Bike share program • Green commercial kitchen for Robertson Lodge at Pine Lake • Solar hot water system designed Farmhouse cabin at Pine Lake *completed or near completed

  17. Changing Campus Behaviors • Reading: Fostering Sustainable Behavior • Random Acts of Sustainability • Observe, document, and select behavior • Needs Assessment Mid-term • What’s the problem? • Is it a problem? • Research method—surveys, interviews, data collection and analysis, IRB • Results—tables and graphs • What can be done about problem?

  18. Behaviors—Final Project • Final Paper • Identify benefits and barriers • Community-Based Social Marketing Technique • Prompts, incentives, model behavior, etc. • Implement CBSMT • Comparative analysis of behavior changes • Write up as research paper and present

  19. Your Cell Phone Charger is Cheating on You • Awareness and Sustainable Behavior in Regard to Vampire Power • by: Nicole Smaranda

  20. Changing Campus Culture • Five-point sustainability agenda presented to Hartwick President • Campus Dining Services and Facilities Staff • Collaborate with faculty and staff • STARS Honors Mini-Seminar • Internships—Recycling projects • Recyclemania Reps • Campus Sustainability Day/Beautification Day • Random Acts of Sustainability become Social Norms • Take pride and ownership in promoting sustainability

  21. Student Perspectives • Being a student, I too can make a difference. I became part of a bigger organization This class gave this group independence and unity all in one.

  22. A lot of us made personal changes in our lives based of what we learned. Change does not just happen, but it definitely impacted the life styles of those involved in the research.

  23. Faculty and staff are not as scary as I thought. Working together with them on a project gave us a sense of equality. They are willing to help and they too share the same interest in sustainability.

  24. If it isn’t fun….it isn’t sustainable! www.hartwick.edu/pinelake pinelake@hartwick.edu

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