Overall Rating Gold
Overall Score 76.57
Liaison Katie Koscielak
Submission Date April 11, 2023

STARS v2.2

Cal Poly Humboldt
EN-7: Employee Educators Program

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.80 / 3.00 Katie Koscielak
Sustainability Analyst
Facilities Mgmt
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Total number of employees:
1,389

Total number of employees served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program:
277

Percentage of employees served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program:
19.94

Name of the employee educators program (1st program):
Sustainability Employee Educators Developing Solutions (SEEDS)

A brief description of the employee educators program (1st program):

An inaugural employee peer educator program was launched in the fall of 2022 to span the 22-23 year and is a reimagination of what had previously been the Green Workplace Assessment Program. The program is a cohort of staff and faculty peer educators who serve as leaders for their area and build a wider sphere of influence on sustainability topics such as waste, energy, environmental justice, transportation, purchasing, & water, among others across campus! Peer educators will be expected to commit one hour per week minimum to the program via a combination of one-on-one consultation, training lectures, field trips, participation in workshops, focused time to create educational materials, green lunchtimes, implementation of educational material, and deployment of new ideas.

Details are as follows:
Description
With support from the Vice President of Administrative Affairs Sherie Gordon, the Sustainability Office is implementing a structured pilot program to cultivate a cohort of employee peer educators who serve as leaders and point people for their area of campus on sustainability issues. Participants will foster improvement and change within their peer group on sustainability topics ranging from issues of waste, energy, transportation, purchasing, water, and environmental justice, among others. This program merges an existing campus workplace sustainability auditing program (called the Green Workplace Assessment) with the concept of employee peer education in service of meeting STARS criteria for EN 7 Employee Peer Educators. Training topics will include: waste, energy, environmental justice, transportation, purchasing, & water, among others. Must be an employee to join.

How does it work?
Peer educator participants in the program will be expected to commit one hour per week for approximately 32 weeks (one hour per week during the academic year) to learning about and deploying sustainability measures that get peer employees more deeply engaged in sustainability solutions for the campus. Participants will become equipped with baseline data that may inform ways to improve their specific office practices, will commit to implementing change at departmental and office levels by dismantling and navigating barriers that prevent sustainability measures from becoming effective, and will educate and encourage their peers to become involved in sustainability practices for the campus.

This program successfully recruited 11 employee participants from 8 departments across campus to lead educational programming for the pilot program.

Commitment & Format
Educators will be expected to commit one hour per week to the program via a combination of one-on-one consultation, training lectures, field trips, participation in workshops, focused time to create educational materials, green lunchtimes, implementation of educational material, and deployment of new ideas. Meeting times will be held on Fridays 11am- noon, with additional content offered (attendance optional) Wednesdays noon- 1pm starting after Friday October 28, 2022. Hourly staff employees may opt in or out to Weds noon meeting times since these will happen during the lunch hour.

Selection
Department leads will need to approve a minimum of one hour of release time per week for this work. This approval may be submitted as a letter of support with the initial letter of interest or when not submitted in the initial application, the Sustainability Office will seek this approval before final decisions are made on the participant list.

Deliverables
At the end of the program, participants must complete all of the following items to receive participation incentives:
-Attend 90% of all synchronous activities and/or demonstrate time devoted to the program at or above 28 hours total for the full school year
-Create and implement six outreach or education tools (one for each month) matching thematic training topics for their area of campus
-Complete pre- and post-surveys for the program
-Author a short 1-2 page reflection on what they learned during their participation in the program
-Demonstrate qualities of leadership and innovation during their time in the program

Incentives
In recognition of successful fulfillment of program obligations, participants who have completed the deliverables outlined above will receive the following participation incentives:
+$500 (taxable per payroll deductions such as medicare and personal withholdings)
This will show up as taxable income on W2’s
This amount will not be counted toward retirement calculations
Receipt of other incentives for the full office such as food, indoor plants, or other ‘swag’
+Letters for Research, Tenure, & Promotion (RTP) files and service to the University records with Human Resources

Throughout participation in the program, participants will receive:
A team sweatshirt or t shirt
A monthly catered lunch


A brief description of the employee educators program’s target audience (1st program):

The inaugural cohort implemented educational activities for their own department colleagues. These consisted of the following departments and # of members:
Alumni 7
PBLC 12
Housing & Res Life 41
Film 1
CCBL 25
IRAR 7
FM 125
ITS 59

sum 277


Number of trained employee educators (1st program):
11

Number of weeks the employee educators program is active annually (1st program):
20

Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained employee educator (1st program):
2

Total number of hours worked annually by trained employee educators (1st program):
440

Website URL where information about the employee educators program is available (1st program) :
Name of the employee educators program (2nd program):
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A brief description of the employee educators program (2nd program):
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A brief description of the employee educators program’s target audience (2nd program):
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Number of trained employee educators (2nd program):
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Number of weeks the employee educators program is active annually (2nd program):
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Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained employee educator (2nd program):
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Total number of hours worked annually by trained employee educators (2nd program):
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Website URL where information about the employee educators program is available (2nd program):
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A brief description of all other employee peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education programs:
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Number of trained employee educators (all other programs):
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Number of weeks, on average, the employee educators programs are active annually (all other programs):
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Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained employee educator (all other programs):
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Total number of hours worked annually by trained employee educators (all other programs):
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Grand total number of hours worked annually by trained employee educators (all programs):
440

Hours worked annually by trained employee sustainability educators per employee served by a peer-to-peer program:
0.32

Website URL where information about the employee sustainability educators programs is available:
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Additional documentation to support the submission:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:

The Sustainability Office hopes to be able to prove success with the inaugural cohort in the 22-23 year and secure funding/incentives to make this an annual, recurring employee program.


The Sustainability Office hopes to be able to prove success with the inaugural cohort in the 22-23 year and secure funding/incentives to make this an annual, recurring employee program.

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.