Johnson County Community College
AC-5: Immersive Experience

Now in its 2nd year, the Las Pintas Solar Experience takes JCCC students on an international service trip to Las Pintas, a suburb of Guadalajara, Mexico. Students work alongside residents to build and install Solar Water Heaters on homes in the Santa Rosa Neighborhood of Las Pintas, where they are immersed in local culture and exposed to sustainability practices as well as challenges. Each resident recipient of a solar water system is responsible for teaching five other families how to build their own systems, thus promoting the spread of skills and awareness for sustainability throughout the community.

Additionally, the college offered a Sustainable Hospitality Internship Program (SHIP) during the reporting period: Students in the JCCC Hospitality program are required to complete a 360-hour internship in the hospitality industry. The SHIP program’s intent is to integrate sustainable practices into Kansas City Metro restaurant operations. Interns are trained in best practices for saving energy and water, reducing waste through recycling and composting programs, using environmentally friendly cleaners and chemicals and reducing supply chain waste and pollution through the use of local product purchases. They then use that knowledge to work with restaurant and hotel managers to identify how the facility could implement the practices. More about SHIP: http://www.jccc.edu/sustainability/projects/hospitality.html