Luther College
EN-1: Student Educators Program

In 2014-15 a total of five Sustainability Educators were hired by the Sustainability Office to work in each of the first year residence halls. The primary responsibility of Educators was to work with Resident Assistants to plan sustainability-related programming in the halls. Educators were responsible for creating monthly bulletin boards which highlighted different aspects of campus sustainability and had it as their goal to plan one program with each RA/floor each semester. Programs included cooking classes, hiking, local farm tours, off the grid home tours, thrift store shopping, co-op tours, and other activities.

Educators were selected through an application process. Interested students applied for the positions and were interviewed by the hall director of the building with the position opening and a staff member from the sustainability office. The available positions were promoted to all students on campus through the student work office and other campus communications channels. In some cases, a hall director may recommend a student who seemed especially sustainability-oriented and a good fit for the position.

Sustainability Educators met with staff from the Sustainability Office and all hall directors from first year buildings on a biweekly basis. During meetings Educators received informal training on program planning, coordination, logistics and how best to work with RAs and residents.

Each of the Sustainability Educators was supported by at least one Hall Director and one member of the Sustainability Office staff. Educators and RAs had the ability to complete a simple funding application if programming required financial support (ie cooking classes, mileage to local farms, etc). The Sustainability Office provided somewhere in the range of $1000-$2000 each year to support the activities of Educators in the halls. Sustainability Educators were also paid for their work through the work study program.

For the 2016-17 academic year we decided to switch our approach to peer to peer education slightly. We moved away from our model of residence hall-specific sustainability educators toward a model in which student educators are hired by program area. We have two students working as energy educators, two working as zero waste educators and one sustainable transportation educator. These students are hired through the work study program and work directly under our Energy and Waste Fellow to do peer outreach in their respective focus area.

The Energy Educators have developed monthly energy challenges for first year residence halls and are responsible for carrying those out. They also have been monitoring solar PV production and electricity consumption in the sustainability house and working on initiatives to encourage residents to keep usage down. These students are also responsible for developing a sustainability audit and engagement tool that will be used with students wishing to learn more about their impact and what they can do to reduce their carbon footprint at Luther.

Our Zero Waste Educators conducted 18 waste audits the first seven weeks of Fall semester 2016 and have developed educational campaigns around the findings of those audits. They are conducting monthly campus-wide waste reduction challenges about things like how to properly dispose of a disposable coffee cup in our waste stream. They will be conducting follow-up audits in Spring 2017 and helping coordinate move-out waste efforts, which is largely a peer to peer effort. During Januarys 2016 student workers coordinated "weigh the waste" events in the cafeteria to educate students about plate waste while at the same time providing personal compost bins and tools for taking action.

Our Sustainable Transportation Educator is tasked with coordinating winter bike storage and has also revamped Luther's Facebook Ride-sharing page to be a group. Activity has increased significantly and he has conducted surveys of how and why people are using this service. He has put together educational videos about bike safety that have been shared with all of campus and is in the process of gathering feedback about covered bike racks at Luther.

Applications are accepted on a rolling basis via a form on our website and reviewed as positions become available. Interviews are conducted and students are hired. Our educator positions are highly competitive.

All student workers are required to attend an orientation prior to starting their work with us in the Fall. Students attend the same common session and then are broken up by group, with educators falling into one group. At that point students receive training about their expectations and our goals for the year. The Energy and Waste Fellow then meets with each group of educators (Energy, Zero Waste and Sustainable Transportation) to review some history of Luther's programs, show data, generate ideas and talk about the year ahead. This series of training helps orient the students to their roles. They also participate in sustainability council and task group meetings where they are asked to present on their work and have a chance to learn more about the inter-workings of campus. Direct supervision, guidance and support is provided by the Energy and Waste Fellow on a weekly (and sometimes daily) basis.

These student educators are all paid as part of our work study program and are supported directly by sustainability staff. The sustainability office provides funding to support projects and ideas developed by the students that align with institutional goals.

During move-out week students either volunteer on behalf of an organization or are added to our work study roster to assist with move-out. We engage about 50 students as waste diverters throughout move-out week. Students are responsible for staffing the residence hall donation rooms, dumpsters and recycling bins during scheduled shifts throughout the week. They are responsible for assisting with waste diversion efforts and educating their peers through conversation and by providing assistance as students are moving out.

All of the sustainability workers are asked to assist with move-out if they are available. A call is also put out to all of campus through social media, the website and e-newsletters seeking any students interested in helping out. We will work with any student who wants to be involved and trained as a waste diverter.

Student waste diverters attend a mandatory training the week before move-out to learn about their responsibilities during move-out week and to come up to speed on Luther's goals and why their work during move-out week matters in the grand scheme of the college's zero waste plans.

Sustainability staff are entirely responsible for overseeing move-out week efforts, including training the student waste diverters, coordinating schedules, developing a training program, monitoring activity that week and coordinating with the thrift stores who come through campus every day to pick up donations. In some cases student waste diverters are paid and in other cases students volunteer in exchange for a donation to the student organization of their choosing.