| Overall Rating | Gold |
|---|---|
| Overall Score | 65.14 |
| Liaison | Bremen Leak |
| Submission Date | July 10, 2024 |
Brigham Young University
EN-1: Student Educators Program
| Status | Score | Responsible Party |
|---|---|---|
|
1.98 / 4.00 |
Bremen
Leak Associate Director Sustainability & Continuity |
Part 1. Percentage of students served by a peer-to-peer, sustainability educators program
Total number of students served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program:
Percentage of students served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program:
1st program
A brief description of the student educators program (1st program):
In fall 2022, the Sustainability Office and the Geospatial Technology and Services Lab designed a program to educate and activate students through peer-to-peer conversations about earth stewardship. While climate change is a focus, the program known as Y Talk has a broad scope, encouraging students from all majors to consider how they can personally care for the earth, from recycling, composting, and gardening to shopping locally, taking public transportation, and supporting environmentally-minded political candidates.
An average of 10 student employees per semester (five from the Sustainability Office, five from the Geospatial Technology and Services Lab) run the program, leading discussions during class visits or Green Week activities, and helping fellow students use GIS mapping tools to capture the location, date, and time of each conversation. The result is a countable, plotable exchange among BYU students that demonstrates their sphere of influence around the world. As of May 2024, some 72,000 conversations have been recorded, including 204 from the BYU Cotopaxi Questival in March 2024. Y Talk aims to reach 1 million conversations.
A brief description of the student educators program’s target audience (1st program):
Y Talk targets BYU students but extends to the entire campus community, as both the Sustainability Office and the Geospatial Services and Technology Lab serve the university as a whole. Student employees are trained by their respective employers but come together throughout the year for combined activities and workshops. The program has been praised by climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe, who addressed the entire student body in an October 2022 talk called "Loving All God's Creation" (see video starting at 37:32) and who featured Y Talk in one of her weekly, worldwide newsletters.
Number of trained student educators (1st program):
Number of weeks the student educators program is active annually (1st program):
Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained student educator (1st program):
Total number of hours worked annually by trained student educators (1st program):
Website URL where information about the student educators program is available (1st program):
If reporting students served by additional peer-to-peer programs, provide:
2nd program
A brief description of the student educators program (2nd program):
A brief description of the student educators program’s target audience (2nd program):
Number of trained student educators (2nd program):
Number of weeks the student educators program is active annually (2nd program):
Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained student educator (2nd program):
Total number of hours worked annually by trained student educators (2nd program):
Website URL where information about the student educators program is available (2nd program):
If reporting students served by three or more peer-to-peer programs, provide:
3rd program
A brief description of the student educators program (3rd program):
A brief description of the student educators program’s target audience (3rd program):
Number of trained student educators (3rd program):
Number of weeks the student educators program is active annually (3rd program):
Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained student educator (3rd program):
Total number of hours worked annually by trained student educators (3rd program):
Website URL where information about the student educators program is available (3rd program):
Additional programs
Number of trained student educators (all other programs):
Number of weeks, on average, the student educators programs are active annually (all other programs):
Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per student educator (all other programs) :
Total number of hours worked annually by trained student educators (all other programs):
Part 2. Educator hours per student served by a peer-to-peer educator program
Hours worked annually by trained student sustainability educators per student served by a peer-to-peer program:
Optional Fields
Additional documentation to support the submission:
Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
Beyond Y Talk, student employees of the Sustainability Office run events, manage programs, answer sustainability questions by email and phone, and conduct research, resulting in additional hours per week not counted above. (See BYU's response to "Does the institution offer sustainability-focused student employment opportunities?" in EN-3: Student Life.) The number of students served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program, as recorded above, is approximately half of the Y Talk conversations logged to date, with the assumption that each conversation must include at least two people.
The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.