HEC Montréal
AC-8: Campus as a Living Laboratory

In collaboration with several faculty members, the Office of Sustainability has developed different projects that provide experiential learning opportunities to students from different programs. For instance, a cohort enrolled in the Management and Sustainable Development course offered during the fall of 2020 is working to provide recommendations to ensure that HEC Montreal is a carbon neutral campus by 2030, or 2040 at the latest, under the supervision of a full-time professor. A second cohort is developing recommendations on how to maximize the opportunities offered within the School’s urban agriculture project, Hectare urbain, in terms of engagement, as well as in terms of learning, as a complementary outdoor and experiential learning space for SD-focused courses. The students have provided recommendations that have allowed to complement in-class reflections on governance, efficiency, user and volunteer recruitment, sustainability, and scalability of SD projects. Other projects included live case-studies on different issues related to campus operations.

Moreover, the SD Fund implemented by HEC Montreal in 2018, offers an opportunity for students to develop and implement projects on campus that provide experiential opportunities. Because the Fund is designed to provide coaching and technical assistance, it offers a unique opportunity for students to learn about sustainability best practices in the implementation of different projects. Examples of these projects include the launch of a series of online conversations on equity, diversity and inclusion in the workplace led by the HEC Diversity Committee, the development of social media awareness campaign by the student committee Humaniterre, the development of wellbeing workshops (yoga and mental health) by students or the development of solutions to the lack of selective collection and recycling of polystyrene on campus and its neighbouring community by the Enactus committee.

Finally, in terms of social impact IDEOS, HEC’s think tank focused on social business management, offers several opportunities for students who wish to further their engagement and activities to take part in real-world learning, through specific mandates aimed at leveraging the social impact of businesses, conducting systems analysis, applying in-class acquired concepts into analyzing social issues.

IDEOS is a center in research in social business management. Their work and activities have led IDEOS to become a reference for HEC Montréal and governing bodies regarding social and cultural business, innovation and research. Also, the student group Expression is dedicated to the promotion of arts and culture in the school and is organizing various events. Finally, another student group called Artistes en Affaires, promote business related to arts and organize singing and act by and for the students.

One student group, NOVA, is dedicated to the promotion of student’s public engagement. Its mission is to valorize the link with the community by helping students using their business and management skills to help others, and develop their social management awareness.

Students participating in the Class "sustainable development and management" are working on a project to help HEC Montréal achieve its 2040 Carbon neutrality objective. Students have to assess the school Scopes 1 and 2 emissions, and develop a tracking system to help the school set targets and follow up on progress.

HEC Montréal's infrastructure department is regularly supporting students’ project by providing data and access to its knowledge in building management. For example, in 2020, a group of students from an operation and logistic chose to study the janitorial waste collection route. The goal of their research was to establish how the waste collection system in occupants’ office can have an impact on their behavior towards sorting their waste.

In partnership with BOMA Québec (Building Owner and Manager Association), undergraduate students of the 2020 AGIR cohort are working on the analysis of COVID-19 impact and commercial and institutional building energy consumption. They will have to contact participating building owners, including HEC's, to understand and determine how buildings performed during confinement, and which best practices allowed building managers to reduce the most of their energy consumption.

Hectare Urbain is HEC’s urban agriculture project, integrating sustainability concept into an institutional and community project in line with the school mission. It promote exchange and thinking around food issues, knowledge development, awareness toward resource and biodiversity preservation, and valorization of students and faculty knowledge for the community.

Every year, undergraduate students are given a short case studies using the school latest waste and recycling data to assess our progress and to propose new initiative to improve waste diversion/decrease waste production. This is the occasion for maintenance manager to test new visual display, assess the user’s understanding, and test new communication tools.

Faire faire une étude de consomation d'eau par étudiant

Many of the MBA students follow an optional logististic class where the final project is based on a real field work. Annually, the course professor, Marie-Hélène Jobin, will develop some of the project in collaboration with HEC administrative departments to improve some of their process and bring fresh ideas to manager. In 2020, MBA students worked on a project to streamline service request processing, ensure quick sorting of service call, and optimize the database.

As part of the new EDI program student bodies are key stakeholders to help and support the school new strategy and action plan. Students who are engaged in committees promoting diversity have been recruited to be part of the School's working group and have been given a central role in defining the program orientations and structure, giving them an opportunity to develop their leadership on this important topic. Moreover, the EDI Advisor and the Office of Sustainability are supporting the students’ committees in their initiatives to foster dialogue around EDI. For instance, they have facilitated access to the School’s ressources to launch a series of Conversations on EDI, they have ensured promotion of the month of ADHD awareness and included a episode on EDI in the sustainability podcast launched by the sustainability peer-learning group, l’escouade DD.

Many of the MBA students follow an optional logististic class where the final project is based on a real field work. Annually, the course professor, Marie-Hélène Jobin, will develop some of the project in collaboration with HEC administrative departments to improve some of their process and bring fresh ideas to manager. In 2020, MBA students worked on a project to address employee well-being. Their goal was to create a process where employee could get quick assistance to set their workspace according to their physiology and health condition.