Seattle University
PA-1: Sustainability Coordination

The President’s Committee for Sustainability (PCS) was convened in March 2011. The purpose of the Committee is to advance and deepen Seattle University’s commitment to ecological justice through collaboration, transparency and inclusion. This committee serves to advocate and advance sustainability at the university in the following ways: --Advise and report to the President and Cabinet on campus sustainability --Provide support and coordination for campus members to pursue and share their interests and knowledge in sustainability within campus and in the community --Oversee, monitor and report on the progress of sustainability strategies on campus, including the university’s climate action plan, and report and communicate about sustainability to the university and community.

The Committee has two Co-chairs, 20 Members from various departments across campus, and Communication Liaisons from every University department and academic department across campus. The 20 members are: 1. The Director of Environmental Science (Faculty) 2. The Director of Environment Studies (Faculty) 3. The Director of the Center for Student Involvement (staff) 4. One (1) Student from the Graduate Student Council (GSC) 5. One (1) Graduate Student (at large) 6. One (1) Student from the Student Government of Seattle University (SGSU) 7. One (1) Undergraduate Student (at large) 8. One (1) Faculty/Staff from Albers School of Business and Economics 9. One (1) Faculty/Staff from Sport Sustainability Leadership Program 10. Two (2) Staff from Academic Affairs, specifically the Center for Environment Justice and Sustainability (CEJS) (1 faculty; 1 staff) 11. One (1) Staff from Marketing and Communications 12. One (1) Staff from Athletics 13. One (1) Staff from Parking and Transportation Services 14. One (1) Staff from Procurement Services 15. Two (2) Staff from Facilities Services 16. One (1) Staff from Housing and Residence Life 17. Two (2) at large Members (Faculty/Staff)

The Center for Environmental Justice and Sustainability (CEJS): *Serves as a clearinghouse for Seattle U environmental programs and sustainability initiatives *Serves as a steward of SU's Climate Action Plan and sustainability efforts. *Enables innovative and interdisciplinary scholarship, teaching, and learning in sustainability and its intersection with issues of justice. *Organizes and co-sponsors lectures, symposia, conferences, and workshops that engage EJS scholars with the community.

The Center for Environmental Justice and Sustainability (CEJS) opened in 2013. CEJS: --Serves as a clearinghouse for Seattle U environmental programs and sustainability initiatives. --Works to expand sustainability in the Academics by supporting interdisciplinary scholarship, teaching, and learning in environmental justice and sustainability --Tracks SU’s progress towards its Climate Action Plan goals and promotes the increase of sustainable practices at SU --Organizes/co-sponsors lectures, symposia, conferences, and workshops that engage our campus community in action and conversations around environmental justice and sustainability. Substantive Sustainability accomplishments by CEJS: (1) In 2013, Seattle University invested in the Center for Environmental Justice and Sustainability to support excellence within this broad, interdisciplinary area of scholarship. As a result, 28 faculty and 16 student fellows have contributed dozens of presentations and publications to their respective fields. The Center also sponsored two international conferences and published two special journal issues of Interdisciplinary Environmental Review. CEJS has offered internship opportunities to more than 25 undergraduate students and has reached over 3000 members of the Seattle University and neighboring communities through the sponsorship of more than 70 seminars, workshops and special events. The center has built new relationships with local and international partners that have led to service-learning and research projects with SU students and faculty. It has also become the hub for SU’s academic and facilities-related sustainability endeavors. (2) Winter 2016: CEJS compiled and submitted SU's first STARS report. Seattle University obtained a gold rating for its sustainable practices. (3) Fall 2016: Campus-wide commuting survey: In November 2016, CEJS surveyed the campus community to learn how students and employees commute to campus and to update results from the 2007 survey. With this survey, we looked to (1) gather an idea of how Seattle's population and economic growth may have changed the commuting habits of Seattle University community members; (2) obtain data to estimate SU’s carbon footprint for commuters; (3) identify new sustainability initiatives on campus related to commuting; and (4) support the Department of Transportation in its planning. The data revealed a 5% reduction of SU's greenhouse gas emissions from commuting since 2009 (4) Winter 2017: Participation in the annual Recyclemania competition was started on campus by Facilities and CEJS in Winter 2017. Following a 12th place debut in the eight-week worldwide recycling competition last year, SU Facilities has made several important changes that reduce the amount of trash collected from the university. These changes, which include expanded compost collection and moving to a new recycling collection vendor, have reduced waste collection costs by more than $25,000 a year and have increased the university’s diversion rate (a combined re-use, recycling and composting rate) to about 73 percent for 2017. (5) Spring 2017: The first post-Sustainability Literacy Assessment was conducted in Spring 2017 to evaluate the degree to which Seattle University is educating undergraduate students on the social, environmental and economic dimensions of sustainability and climate change. Read more: https://www.seattleu.edu/cejs/