A university on the rise, Stevens is growing rapidly to handle its housing shortage and to create physical space for more classes. But with any institution, there is always something else that can be improved. For a group of three aspiring graduate students, the Stevens Sustainability Coalition is taking on another challenge: sustainability on our campus.
The Stevens Sustainability Coalition (SSC) is a student-led initiative whose vision is to create a culture of sustainability on campus. Both an organization and a movement, it was started by Alex Dubro, Francesco Accurso, and Angelo Falabella with the three students consulting Dr. Dibyendu Sarkar as their faculty advisor. While Falabella graduated last spring with his M.S. in Sustainability Management, Dubro and Accurso, also in the Sustainability Management program, continue to lead the initiative.
The SSC plans to hold forums that promote open, transparent, and collaborative discussion among students, staff, faculty, and administration alike on sustainability issues on campus. While these forums will focus on topics pertinent to the Stevens campus, Dubro and Accurso hope that they will motivate individuals to bring innovative thoughts, attitudes, and perspectives to their communities and continue bringing about positive impact. Other events include panels on environmental and social-environmental issues, held by on and off campus experts, as well as innovation (“incubation”) expos that challenge people to arrive at solutions to sustainability problems, in a format similar to the Business School’s case competitions.
According to Lead Co-facilitator Dubro, the goal of the SSC is not to become an established student organization.
“The SSC is not a club, nor is it an administrative body. It is a student-led initiative and nontraditional networking organization. We generate and develop innovative ideas at our forums, provide a space for stakeholders to give input to the administration, create a directory of subject matter experts (SMEs) and hold panel discussions on relevant topics. Our vision is to make sustainability a fabric of Stevens’ culture. Sustainability is a lifestyle, not a choice.”
Since they are not bound by the standards that clubs or administrative offices usually follow, the SSC has greater potential to connect people from different groups on and off campus. The movement already has both administrative and student support and seeks to continue gathering support by connecting the two. According to Accurso, “I think it’s an exciting time at Stevens […] we can be a support structure for communication between students and the administration.”
The movement helps to aid and promote efforts made by the administration and the student body in order to help Stevens attain an AASHE STARS rating. STARS (Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System) is a self-reporting framework that measures sustainability performance. This rating is given to involved campuses that fulfill certain sustainability benchmarks, and to earn one would demonstrate increased progress in this regard.
The SSC hopes to bring Stevens closer to this goal by continuing to promote the Sustainability Management Plan (SMP), a recommended framework and organized collection of guidelines for sustainability landmarks. Made by Falabella as his capstone project along with Cole Liguori, Ziren Qi, and Wesley Cheung, the plan focuses on four different aspects of sustainability management on Stevens, namely Campus Energy Usage; Waste, Water, and Land Management; Social Engagement; and Financial Responsibility. The SMP includes an addendum by Falabella proposing the founding of an Office of Sustainability, which would aid and direct efforts on campus. Dr. Sarkar served as Advisor, and, as with the SMP, students should feel free to consult Dr. Sarkar regarding similar projects on-campus.
At their kickoff event this previous Wednesday, the SSC stayed true to their word: Dubro led a breakout session, inviting attendees to tackle a common sustainability challenge. The session developed into an open dialogue on what could be done to improve conditions at Stevens. Attendees included members from the SSC, as well as students, faculty, and staff. The meeting started with Dubro presenting the foundational goals of the SSC and ended with a discussion by attendees on how the movement could grow and improve.
Unique to the SSC is its approach to change. Rather than generate ideas and implement them via a top-down approach, the organization gives everyone involved an open-ended sense of autonomy to tackling various problems on campus. Dubro argues that this is yet another element that will foster a culture of sustainability.
The kickoff meeting was a promising start to a new organization, and it already seems to be fulfilling its mission statement of bringing people together. Despite not being an official campus organization, the group has the support of the administration and is hoping to gain the support of other organizations on campus, in Hoboken, and in surrounding localities. The organization seems to have a bright future, and we look forward to seeing how it will assist students, staff, faculty, and the administration in accomplishing increased sustainability on and off campus.
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