Northeastern University
EN-7: Employee Educators Program

The Green Office Challenge Program (GOCP) continues engaging University employees campus-wide in the Program – and campus sustainability overall, and further developing the Eco Ambassador outreach to its interested members. There are over 600 certified Green Office members from over 130 different departments, offices, and groups campus-wide. The Program co-sponsors events throughout the year with events such as World Water Day – Earth Day – and National Energy Efficiency Day - that engage faculty/staff to engage in sustainability awareness, education and actions about issues such as conservation of water, electricity, paper, and other resources, both at Northeastern and our own individual lives.

GOCP is a volunteer-based program that is publicized on the Facilities Sustainability website, https://Facilities.Northeastern.edu/Sustainability, the D'Amore McKim School of Business intranet, weekly newsletter and DMSB Town Hall Meetings, information tabling during a "normal" non-Covid19 academic year, and year-round events (including a GOCP information table specifically located at events campus-wide where possible).

To become Green Office certified and/or an EcoAmbassador, employees are required to complete green office and sustainability questions and get certified at either a bronze, silver, or gold level depending on the final score for their responses. They recertify every year and the program is currently being revamped to make it more user friendly, efficient, and useful. Additionally, a report is being prepared to overview the program's first five years of success, metrics and benchmarks. As COVID-19 restrictions ease up, it is hoped the community service that aligns with the Green Office Program's EcoAmbassadors and their interest in more volunteering and service, will be added to expand the training and educators' opportunities.

The Green Office Challenge Program is supported by Facilities Management. This includes purchase of items for information tabling and events, a tent and pull-up sign, tools to engage people at the information tables (like a spinning wheel that asks many sustainability/green office questions), food budget for the quarterly lunch/learn, co-op student wages, and other materials as needed.

The D’Amore McKim School of Business (DMSB) launched a Sustainability Steering and Planning Committee in March 2020. The intention of this committee is to promote sustainability initiatives within DMSB through its purchasing decisions, education/awareness, and events. To enhance its sustainability efforts within purchasing, the committee created a Procurement Subcommittee. This committee collaborates with the Northeastern University Procurement Office to analyze and access its purchasing decisions in order to shift its purchases towards sustainable, diverse, and inclusive products. The committee has developed new procedures and guidelines with the goal of realigning DMSB purchases to be supportive towards products which support and promote diversity and inclusion in addition to sustainability. The DMSB Sustainability Steering Committee has used competitions and a weekly “Sustainability Corner” in the DMSB weekly newsletter to engage the DMSB community. For example, during March 2020, the Committee is focusing on sustainability and energy to align with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 7: Affordable/Clean Energy. The first piece of engagement is March 1st Sustainability Corner piece on energy tips and includes metrics about savings from using a computer’s sleep mode rather than leaving it on. March also serves as the launch of the Committee’s “Spring 21 Challenge: Thermostat Hawk”, which encourages DMSB community members to share creative ideas about incorporating the energy challenge into their daily life. During 2020, other successful challenges included: water conservation during daily teeth brushing; posts of favorite coffee mugs; photographs of reusable water bottles; COVID-19 reusable mask pictures; and tips about sustainable food choices and actions one can take while working from home. The Committee has received favorable responses from these engaging activities and respondents commented on their interest in the sustainability information that goes along with them. The Office of Sustainability plans to integrate these efforts with the Green Office Challenge Program so that other departments and units in all Northeastern campuses can engage in this as well. The Green Office Challenge Program (GOCP) collaboration with the D’Amore McKim School of Business continues into 2021 and beyond.

The entire DMSB Sustainability Planning Committee is a volunteer-based group with support from the DMSB Dean. Administrative Assistants and key sub-group/unit personnel engage to ensure they can distribute/share information with other faculty and staff, and administrative assistants. The two faculty who initiated the committee originally contacted specific individuals to join but as its success grows and is publicized, others have asked to join as well.

Multiple lunch and learns took place 2020-2021 in the DMSB to help educate its employees on sustainability and energy conversation, and prepare the peer outreach employees for either specific tasks with data collection, analysis and competitions. Additionally, many are already EcoAmbassadors or somehow involved with the Green Office Challenge Program so they are helping to better educate themselves in sustainability so they can in turn continue educating and engaging their coworkers.

The DMSB Dean supports the program through the resources made available through employees working on the Sustainability Planning Steering Committee: allowed work time to collect and analyze data/information, engage in regular meetings, and collaborate with other employees, as well as food for events held during non-Covid-19 time periods.