Brigham Young University
AC-8: Campus as a Living Laboratory

Social Impact Projects are offered by the BYU Marriott School of Business’s Ballard Center for Social Impact. Through this on-campus internship program, students work on projects for organizations that make a difference, such as Latter-day Saint Charities, Walmart, The Other Side Academy, and the BYU Sustainability Office. Supported by academic advisors, students work 7 to 9 hours per week, comprise 20 to 35 interdisciplinary teams per semester, and earn three credit hours. By design, these projects advance solutions to social and environmental challenges. 

The Daily Universe is an educational lab tied to the curriculum of the news media sequence in the BYU School of Communications. Trained and mentored by BYU staff and faculty, about 200 communications students work each year work for The Daily Universe. Green Week is covered each semester, and stories about sustainability, including BYU-led initiatives like Grow the Flow, appear regularly in print or online. 

Y Life Science is a podcast highlighting research and projects originating in the BYU College of Life Sciences. Hosted by BYU staff and students, the podcast is produced by the Bean Life Science Museum. Episodes have focused on BYU Sustainability, BYU Recycling, "Y Talk," and other sustainability-related initiatives that put classroom learning into action on campus and beyond.

The BYU Air Quality Research Lab studies the sources and effects of air quality issues and mitigation strategies. Led by mechanical engineering professor Bradley Adams, the lab engages some 25 undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral students in designing and testing an advanced combustion system to reduce CO2 emissions. In the past five years, lab members have written or presented more than 25 peer-reviewed articles or conference papers.

The BYU Sustainability Lab is an interdisciplinary lab researching the convergence of the built environment, natural environment, and social environment. In 2023, lab members designed and built an award-winning house made of energy-efficient, monolithic domes. Guided by civil and construction engineering professor Andrew South, the student team constructed and tested the house on campus while competing in the U.S. Solar Decathlon, the Orange County Solar Decathlon, and the Utah Valley Parade of Homes. The lab also designed a carbon-neutral community for transitioning homeless populations while competing in the American Society of Civil Engineers' Sustainable Solutions Competition.

The FLOW Lab specializes in aerodynamics and optimization, with applications in aircraft design and wind energy systems. Led by mechanical engineering professor Andrew Ning, the lab competed recently in a national collegiate wind competition with members of BYU’s Wind Energy Club. Research sponsors include NASA, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, the Facebook Connectivity Lab, and others. 

The BYU Sensory Lab is managed by the Nutrition, Dietetics & Food Science Department. Its employees run taste-testing panels, conduct tests, collect data, and analyze consumer preferences. Instead of binning food waste, lab members contribute leftovers to BYU's composting operations, which help to beautify campus.

BYU Dining Services employs hundreds of students every day to feed a community of nearly 40,000 people. Meals are planned and prepared onsite, guided by a commitment to decrease the use of limited resources. Each semester, a dietetics intern consults the Sustainability Office on ongoing projects, and student employees of the Sustainability Office are invited to tour BYU Dining Services facilities.

BYU Grounds is working with turf and soil professors to replace the athletic turf in LaVell Edwards Stadium with a water-wise hybrid turf that uses 30 percent less water. The student-led project was featured in BYU President Kevin J Worthen’s first campus address of the 2022-2023 academic year. See video, from 12:50 to 16:25: https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/kevin-j-worthen/this-is-a-student/

Within Grounds, BYU Recycling employs students to collect, sort, and bale recyclables such as cardboard, paper, bottles, and cans. In 2024, the Student Employment Office wrote on Instagram, "Become a Reycling Center Specialist. Further BYU's environmental stewardship efforts, gain practical work experience, and help save the planet!"

In early 2024, BYU's Introduction to Sustainable Business course, taught by Dr. Bekki Brau, invited global supply chain management students to review BYU's procurement policies and suggest improvements as a final project. Members of BYU's Sustainable Working Group judged the resulting presentations, where students shared best practices from other STARS-rated universities and highlighted product recommendations, including high-efficiency fixtures, electric vehicles, and sustainable office paper.

Sponsored by the Sustainability Office, a capstone team of five engineering students surveyed more than 800 students to identify transportation behaviors among BYU community members and establish a baseline for future research. Led by Dr. Gregory Macfarlane, a BYU professor and a member of the Provo City Transportation and Mobility Advisory Commission, the team found that while most students walked or biked to campus, single-occupancy vehicles were still a common source of congestion, competition, and frustration on and around campus, suggesting a need for better policy and education among students who live off campus. Dr. Macfarlane has published extensively on sustainable transportation and urban accessibility.

The Hansen Lab works to create biofuel and other alternative energy solutions using manure, human waste, algea, sawdust, and other organic waste. Led by chemistry professor Jaron Hansen, the lab also supports and interprets air sampling campaigns and investigates the kinetics and spectroscopy of atmospherically important molecules. Its research facility is located in the Ezra Taft Bensen Building.

BYU ecologist Ben Abbott and his students led a 2023 scientific paper on the Great Salt Lake, calling for immediate and urgent action to protect and restore the lake to its minimum healthy elevation. CNN, The Guardian, and news outlets throughout the Intermountain West broadcast the findings. BYU’s Y Magazine also highlighted ways in which BYU scientists are addressing the American West’s ongoing drought.

BYU’s Hydroinformatics Lab created a tool to visualize streamflow forecasts around the world, identify flood and drought risks, and save lives. Led by civil and construction engineering professor Jim Nelson, the lab supports the Group on Earth Organizations (GEO), whose GEOGLOWS project enhances global water sustainability, with applications in South America, Africa, and southern Asia.

Student employees in the Sustainability Office support coordination and planning efforts on campus. At any time, two to five students work for the office, funded by BYU’s experiential learning initiative. Additional students are often recommended by academic departments and, when hired, funded by those departments’ own experiential learning budgets. Just as often, student interns work with the Sustainability Office for academic credit. The Sustainability Office’s lead sustainability coordinator, a student, also serves on BYU’s Sustainability Working Group, tasked with creating its long-term sustainability plan.

Student and employee wellness teams hire student employees and interns to lead activities and initiatives throughout the year. These include BYU's annual Bike to Work Day and Lazy Triathlon. Student employees of BYU's adventure center, Outdoors Unlimited, also apply classroom learning to organize expeditions, teach skills, or host competitions, such as summer road and mountain biking challenges.

BYU prioritizes experiential learning on campus, connecting classrooms with operational and administrative offices to solve challenges and help students gain real-world experience. The Careers and Experiential Learning Office catagorizes experiential learning into six types:

• A Culminating Learning Experience is an umbrella term for most project/event-based learning experiences. Culminating Learning Experiences include but are not limited to capstone projects, project-based learning (SIPs or experiential projects through the Marriot school), competitions, conferences, symposiums, workshops, festivals, recitals, portfolios, and senior theses.


• Field studies and field work are typically opportunities where a research team or company mentor students to become more familiar in their field. Most field studies are clinical/scientific in nature, but it can include a variety of other fields. Often times field studies gather new data alongside BYU faculty.


• An internship is an opportunity provided by an organization to give career related experience to students related to their major. A student may or may not be compensated financially for this experience. Students who participate in internships have the opportunity to explore what their career may look like. The mission of an internship is to support the integration of theory and practice, explore careers, and provide personal and professional development.


• Clubs, service opportunities, and on-campus leadership workshops/activities are all in-person experiences that help students become a part of something greater. These experiences include collaboration with other students, helping those in need, and leading groups and communities in order to help students (participants and the student body as a whole) learn though service.


• Several professors offer on/off-campus research opportunities. These faculty typically look for students within major-related classes, posts on their college’s page, or even listings under BYU jobs. Students may also create their own research projects that would likewise be directed by faculty member on a topic of mutual interest. Students will identify and examine a substantive academic research problem and report their findings.


• A study abroad is guided by a BYU professor in the field and offers lectures, study, and research on-site. Field trips to important locations of cultural and historical significance support the program's academic aims and bring to life theory and principles gained in the classroom. These trips are usually a semester long, filled with new adventures and experiences. See AC-5 for more information. 

BYU also employs a significant number of student employees, peaking at around 16,000 in 2024.