Pratt Institute
AC-8: Campus as a Living Laboratory

The Pratt Sustainability Center (PSC) serves as a physical and virtual hub for Pratt’s commitment to educate environmentally responsible citizens. PSC encourages the use of Pratt’s campus as a living laboratory linking the classroom to campus initiatives. The PSC houses a materials research center that supports faculty, students and alumni in the integration of sustainability into their professional lives. PSC supports and critiques studio work in Architecture, Design, and Fine Arts each semester; projects that relate specifically to campus sustainability include efforts to eliminate single-use plastic water bottles (the Ban the Bottle campaign), repurpose discarded art and design supplies (the Give/Take program), and reduce the use of toxic materials in painting and design studios.
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Amy Khoshbin, Pratt's Fine Arts civic engagement fellow, is engaged in several initiatives regarding sustainability, campus and community engagement.
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Beyond and Between Pratt's Gates, a collaboration between Art & Design Education and Historic Preservation: Working with students from different majors, you will design a public history project about activists, social reformers and critical events in Pratt’s past. You will explore why, and how, those with power and those with little power encouraged, or discouraged, social justice reforms and community partnerships. Your project will culminate in a pop up exhibition, walking tour, or alternative historical marker that makes a case for preserving an unseen story about Pratt’s past.

Amy Khoshbin, Pratt's Fine Arts civic engagement fellow, is engaged in several initiatives regarding sustainability, campus and community engagement, as well as public engagement.
Fine Arts’ Fellowship in Civic Engagement is a one (renewable to two) year position for an established artist who is active in collaborative, socially engaged practices that seek to address the social and political realities of communities. The Fellowship fosters interdisciplinary collaboration across the institute and forges relationships with external communities and organizations. In addition to teaching responsibilities in the Fine Arts Department, the fellow will develop programming and/or workshops connecting their practice to internal and external communities.
https://commons.pratt.edu/prattfinearts/pratt-civic-engagement/

The Environmental Sensing Lab, directed by Drs. Monica Maceli (SILS) and Helio Takai (MSCI), explores the applications of micro-controllers, single-board computers, sensors, and other physical computing devices in monitoring environmental conditions within cultural heritage organizations.

The undergraduate course SUST 401 Power, Pollution, and Profit (developed as an interdisciplinary seminar as part of the Sustainability Studies minor) has a formal collaboration with Pratt's facilities department (including having been taught by Director of Administrative Sustainability Anthony Gelber). Pratt's campus represents change and continuity in the history of energy regimes, and students examine the relationship between buildings and energy from the nineteenth century (with site visits to Pratt's American Society of Mechanical Engineers-landmarked steam plant) to the twenty-first century (with the LEED-Gold certified administration building Myrtle Hall). Students develop individual or team projects to recommend best practices based upon the sites they survey. Final projects include student papers on using Life-Cycle Assessments to optimize building performance, and evaluating how well LEED certified building addresses current campus environmental issues.

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The Environmental Sensing Lab, directed by Drs. Monica Maceli (SILS) and Helio Takai (MSCI), explores the applications of micro-controllers, single-board computers, sensors, and other physical computing devices in monitoring environmental conditions within cultural heritage organizations.

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The Spring 2020, SES-755 Greening Existing Buildings course proposed building system retrofits for Higgins Hall (School of Architecture). Students used equipment from the new Building Performance Lab to document current building performance, and proposed solutions to improve energy generation and efficiency, water management, temperature regulation, indoor air quality, and food production.

The undergraduate course SUST 401 Power, Pollution, and Profit (developed as an interdisciplinary seminar as part of the Sustainability Studies minor) has a formal collaboration with Pratt's facilities department (including having been taught by Director of Administrative Sustainability Anthony Gelber). Pratt's campus represents change and continuity in the history of energy regimes, and students examine the relationship between buildings and energy from the nineteenth century (with site visits to Pratt's American Society of Mechanical Engineers-landmarked steam plant) to the twenty-first century (with the LEED-Gold certified administration building Myrtle Hall). Students develop individual or team projects to recommend best practices based upon the sites they survey. Final projects include student papers on using Life-Cycle Assessments to optimize building performance (including energy issues), and considering how application of Passive retrofitting standards would affect campus energy consumption.

In the SES-635A 1-credit course in the M.Sc. in Sustainable Environmental Systems, Solid Waste Management, students often use the school cafeteria, and food and dining services as a case study for investigations on food waste reduction, composting, packaging and single use container reduction and other waste management strategies. Example (Spring 2019): Waste management plan: It’s a compost time at Pratt Cafeteria, by a student team. This is a study of the waste management practices of the main cafeteria located at Pratt Institute’s Brooklyn campus. Where Sustainable recommendations are proposed at the end to better manage the waste generated.

Eleonora Del Federico (MSCI) and Maria Sieira (Architecture): The Scientific Study of Radiant Floors in Outdoor Classrooms, a Collaboration at the Chemistry/Architecture Interface
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Pratt Textile Dye Garden: Cultivating beds of indigo, marigolds, dahlias, hibiscus, and goldenrod, Pratt Institute students are exploring how to make natural dyes from seed to harvest. The Textile Dye Garden was planted in Cannoneer Court on the Brooklyn campus this year, and through workshops and classroom experiences has given students hands-on experimentation with turning flowers, leaves, and other organic material into natural dyes.

In the SES-635A 1-credit course in the M.Sc. in Sustainable Environmental Systems, Solid Waste Management, students often use the school campus - specifically Higgins Hall, home of the School of Architecture - as a case study of waste management systems, and a testing ground for proposed policy, management, and infrastructural improvements. Example (Spring 2019): Architecture School Waste project by a student team. A study of the waste management practices in Pratt's School of Architecture, specifically waste produced by the School's faculty.

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FASHION dept partnership with FABSCRAP: Studio faculty facilitate use of the service and Contextualizing classes host visits/education.

Pratt’s Sustainable Environmental Systems program is a leader in innovative efforts to research, design, and implement Green Infrastructure in New York City. Managing stormwater runoff and water pollution in a sustainable and equitable way is one of the city’s major environmental challenges. Pratt is participating by constructing green infrastructure on campus by retrofitting the Cannoneer Court Parking Lot and installing a green roof on North Hall. The Sustainable Environmental System’s Green Infrastructure Design Build Studio provides students with the skills to design green infrastructure in a variety of settings. These initiatives, along with several ongoing faculty and student research projects, bring together students, faculty, alumni and professionals across the city to holistically tackle this pressing environmental issue.

https://www.pratt.edu/academics/architecture/sustainable-environmental-systems/green-infrastructure/

A Minecraft-driven collaborative design workshop to envision the future of Higgins Hall plaza, part of a broader Pratt Center for Community Development-funded initiative by SAVI and GCPE to entice youth participation in local design projects funded via participatory budgeting. The workshop entailed gathering some data about the use of Minecraft as a tool for collaborative design using the Higgins Hall plaza as a test site, with design principles based on equity and inclusion and access.