President's Committee

President’s Committee for Sustainability 

The President’s Committee for Sustainability (PCS) oversees our Climate Action Plan implementation. The 25-member committee includes faculty, staff and students from all areas of campus.  Four subcommittees are working on the initiatives below to achieve our goals to educate undergrad and grad students about climate change and sustainability in and out of the classroom, eliminate greenhouse gas emissions from operations and transportation, and share our knowledge with others.  All faculty, students and staff are encouraged to participate on the subcommittees -contact the subcommittee chair.

Carl Obermiller, Faculty Co-chair; Robert Schwartz, Staff Co-chair; Karen Price, Committee Coordinator

Academic Programs Subcommittee   (Subcommittee chair Carl Obermiller, Professor and Dept. of Marketing Chair)

  • Define the concept of sustainability for Seattle University.
  • Survey courses to catalog those with a focus on sustainability and those with related material, categorized by departments and programs. 
  • Develop a survey to annually assess the desired level of sustainability knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors in students, faculty and staff.  
  • Create incentives for faculty course development and faculty research focused on sustainability.  
  • Integrate sustainability into the core curriculum.  
  • Establish Academic Center of Excellence on Sustainability.
  • Increase student engagement with faculty research on sustainability.
  • Link learning opportunities with university sustainability projects. 

 

Co-curricular Programs Subcommittee   (Subcommittee chair Alvin Sturdivant, Assistant Vice President for Student Development)

  • Develop learning outcomes connected to Seattle U’s learning objectives
  • Refine current peer-to-peer sustainability education program
  • Communicate existing co-curricular sustainability programs to students
  • Develop guidelines for reducing the impact of campus events

 

Campus Operations Subcommittee     (Subcommittee chair Karen Price, Campus Sustainability Manager)

  • Explore adding compost bins inside all buildings
  • Educate faculty and staff on how and what to recycle and compost via department meetings
  • Promote the video and web conferencing meeting services as an alternative to auto and plane travel
  • Explore installing electric vehicle charging stations
  • Explore an online ride matching service for faculty, staff and students.

 

Marketing & Communications Subcommittee     (Subcommittee chair Mike Thee, Online Editor for Marketing and Communications)

  • Engage campus stakeholders in the President’s Committee for Sustainability.
  • Increase opportunities for individuals to engage in sustainability on campus.
  • Increase Seattle U’s network of community partners in sustainability.
  • Increase communications to students, faculty and staff of Seattle U’s sustainability initiatives and how they can participate.
  • Write stories for The Commons of what faculty and staff are doing within their departments and what student clubs are doing.
  • Review all Seattle U marketing materials to ensure that Seattle U’s commitment to sustainability and achievements are included.
  • Create a faculty and staff peer-to-peer educational effort.