Harvey Mudd College
EN-10: Community Partnerships

The Energize Colleges Program is a formal community partnership between Harvey Mudd College, Claremont McKenna College, and Strategic Energy Innovations (bay area non-profit). The program is designed to develop students' knowledge, skills, and experience in energy career pathways and to aid their transition into the green workforce through semester-long internships on- and off-campus, as well as through financial support for course/degree creation and or modular integration related to energy topics. The program also has a mandatory high school outreach component for participating interns, in which students can deliver presentations or facilitate workshops for students at local high schools. The program has a three-year minimum commitment, in which SEI provides full financial support (via state utility ratepayer funds) during the first year, 50% support the second year, and solely administrative support the third year. As the program has transitioned into its second and soon-to-be third years, Harvey Mudd College will absorb more of the financial commitment - and it has already provided a number of material commitments: including space for a full-time Climate Corps fellow to help coordinate the program, resources for that fellow and for Energize Colleges interns to succeed in their internships, and more. Through the internships and through the high school outreach components, the program addresses all components of sustainability: (1) many of our high school outreach presentations have been oriented around social, environmental, and economic justice as it pertains to energy accessibility and resources; (2) each internship and each high school outreach component has a unique emphasis on economic prosperity, including how to make energy or renewable energy more affordable for individuals and for municipalities; and (3) all internships are focused on contextually focused on environmental and ecological health, under the pre-tense that the focus on energy is concerned around that being the largest lever to reduce negative ecological impacts. In this case, underrepresented groups and vulnerable populations have certainly been involved equally throughout the implementation of Energize Colleges, especially as it pertains to involving high schools from low-income areas and working with organizations who focus on supporting underrepresented groups and vulnerable populations. Those individuals and groups play a critical role in making Energize Colleges an effective and impactful program. URL: https://www.hmc.edu/hcsed/energize-colleges-program/

The Claremont Locally Grown Power (CLGP) initiative is a formal partnership between Harvey Mudd College, the Community Home Energy Retrofit Project (CHERP; a local non-profit), idealPV, and a number of other local institutions. The initiative aims to utilize patented technology that eliminate reverse bias on common solar cells, which allows for the use of lower grade photovoltaics, towards creating cheaper solar panels (since renewable energy tends to be affordable only for more affluent individuals and families). The ultimate aim of the initiative is to map out and build a local solar panel factory in or near the City of Claremont, with the aim of creating jobs in Claremont, stimulating the local economy, and providing renewable energy and thus cheaper energy for lower-income families in the city and surrounding areas. Harvey Mudd College has provided material and financial support to the program. The Hixon Center has offered space for CHERP to use to test solar cells, as well as paid interns for the initiative through the Energize Colleges program. Additionally, the college has agreed to partner with CHERP to set up a clinic program at Mudd for CLGP - in this context, junior and senior students spend their year helping advance the goals of the initiative with guidance from professionals from CHERP. The program has been in place for a couple of years and will continue for the years ahead. The program addresses all three dimensions of sustainability. The premise is that buildings are the biggest lever to pull in terms of reducing energy consumption and consequently GHG emissions (ecological health). Following principles of a circular economy, the CLGP initiative/partnership aims to build a factory in Claremont, with the aim of employing Claremont residents who will build cheaper solar panels for Claremont residents to use. This keeps more money in Claremont and gives lower-income residents more spending power since their energy will be cheaper (economic prosperity and social equity and wellbeing). URL: https://www.hmc.edu/hcsed/energize-colleges-program/internships/claremont-locally-grown-power-clgp/