One Sustainable Building At A Time

Kris Govertsen outside of the Bellas/Dixon Math and Science Center—the building that inspired her passion.

ONE SUSTAINABLE BUILDING AT A TIME

Engineer Kris Govertsen ’15 has blueprints for building responsibly—and her Pro Vita course will embolden students to protect the planet by changing how we construct and live in spaces.

BY MEGAN TADY

It started with a building.

Every day, Kris Govertsen ’15 walked past the construction site of the Bellas/Dixon Math and Science Center on campus, witnessing the scaffolding emerge and gaping at the guts of a building. It was like peering inside a body, at a skeleton with muscles and organs.

“I got to see the foundation poured,” Govertsen says. “I got to see the bones go up. I had never seen the steel beams of a building because they’re usually covered up. When you look at a building, you see the windows, but you don’t see the HVAC, and you don’t see the pipes. You don’t see everything that actually makes the building work. Just every day, walking by, I got to see a little more of it come together.”

And every day, her interest grew. “Watching the construction, I thought, ‘I want to do that. How do I do that?’”

Govertsen was most inspired by Berkshire School’s commitment to sustainable building practices and Bellas/Dixon’s Certified LEED Gold status. The Center, which opened in 2012, integrates energy-

Kris Govertsen received the Frederica Clarkson Award at the Clarkson University 2018 commencement ceremony. The Award is traditionally given to a top student in the graduating class. Photo courtesy of Clarkson University.

efficient features like passive solar heating and open grid ceilings with striking architecture that optimizes light and maximizes views. Govertsen not only saw the entire construction process, but she also took classes in the Center, including using a lab for an independent study to make biodiesel. “It inspired me to pursue multiple degrees in order to change the planet one sustainable building at a time,” she says.

After Berkshire, Govertsen earned a B.S. at Clarkson University in civil engineering and is currently pursuing an M.S. in sustainable building systems and an interdisciplinary Ph.D. at Northeastern University while researching passive survivability. And all along, Bellas/Dixon has served as her touchpoint.

“Every time we talk about integrated design in class, I always think of Bellas/ Dixon,” she says. “It’s my personal case study.”

Now, she’s returning to campus to teach a Pro Vita course about sustainable design, titled, “Bears Being Better and Building Better: Introduction to Daily Sustainable Practices and Building Design,” and again, she’s using Bellas/Dixon as her inspiration.

“I think it’s important for students to know, ‘Why did Berkshire build this building? Why is it LEED certified? And why is sustainability important? Not just to our school, but to our society, to our country, to our planet, and to you personally.’”

A Terrible Winter Actually, it started with skiing. A competitive skier from the age of nine, Govertsen raced at Jiminy Peak in Hancock, Mass., and she saw the resort install its first wind turbine, named Zephyr, to reduce its carbon footprint and energy costs.

“That winter after Jiminy Peak installed the turbine was one of the worst recorded winters in my

“I think it’s importantfor students to know,‘Why did Berkshire buildthis building? Why isit LEED certified? Andwhy is sustainabilityimportant? Not just toour school, but to oursociety, to our country,to our planet, and to

you personally.’”

experience,” Govertsen says. “It was so ironic to me that my ski area was making this movement for a sustainable future, and that same winter, the area had relatively light snowfall and an abundance of mixed precipitation, particularly ice. Not exactly the best of winters.”

While the skiing gave her a window into climate change, it also introduced her to Berkshire School via her ski coach, John Borwick ’81, who coaches at the School. Head Coach Borwick told Govertsen that the School was trying to create an all-girls ski team. “I ended up going to Berkshire and joining that original all-girls ski team,” she says. “If you look at the trophy, I was the first-ever MVP of the all-girls ski team at Berkshire. That’s my little

Berkshire legacy.”

For three summers, Govertsen and other Berkshire skiers traveled with Coach Borwick to Mount Hood in Oregon to continue their training. It was there that Govertsen saw more effects of climate change; the glacier was melting.

“Mount Hood is my favorite place in the world,” she says. “To see the kind of effects that climate change has had on my favorite place breaks my heart. I want to try to do my part to save the skiing, as the sticker goes. A lot of people who are interested in winter sports are interested in sustainability, because that is going to be one of the first things to suffer as average global atmospheric temperatures increase.”

As Govertsen prepares to teach her Pro Vita course, she marvels at how she’s come full circle.

“Skiing got me into sustainability,” she says. “Then, skiing got me to Berkshire. Then, Berkshire blew up my interest in sustainability by introducing me to other source methods of renewable energy. The solar panel field across the street was the first solar field I’d ever seen. Then, seeing Bellas/Dixon and learning about LEED influenced what I’m studying in college.”

And now, she’s coming back to campus to teach, partly to educate young people, and partly to pay homage to the school that had a powerful impact on her. “I am so grateful for going to Berkshire,” she says. “I thought my coursework at Berkshire was the hardest coursework I’ve had to date. It definitely prepared me.”

“Change is never going to be easy. If it was easy, it would be changed already. Someone has to ignite the change, so it might as well be you.”

Sustainability Isn’t Rude

People are never going to stop building. But Govertsen, who earned her LEED Green Classroom Professional and LEED Green Associate certifications in 2017, wants people to build differently—better, actually, by safeguarding the planet. And she’s hoping that her Pro Vita course at Berkshire will embolden a younger generation to radically transform how we see buildings and how we build them.

“When we build something, everything that we do is sacrificing something else,” she says. “We’re taking away the natural habitat of plants, animals, and organisms. We need to recognize that and understand our relationship with that ecosystem. It’s not unethical to build. But we need to integrate the built environment in such a way that it restores and regenerates the displaced or disrupted ecosystem instead of replacing it.”

Govertsen is developing the Pro Vita course with the help of Science Department Chair Dr. April Burch, who expressed her excitement in welcoming Govertsen back to campus. “She and I share a special connection with Bellas/ Dixon, and I am eager to see how she

weaves that connectedness, a real sense of place, into her Pro Vita class,” Burch says. “I have followed her career since she has left Berkshire and have been inspired by her dedication to the sciences. I expect to learn a great deal from her that week.”

During the course, Govertsen says she wants to encourage students to think about personal responsibility and the environment.

“We can build a beautiful building that is LEED or Energy Star certified, but if we aren’t cognizant of our usage, it’s still not going to perform as intended,” she says. “We might have low-flow fixtures in all the bathrooms with sensors, but if you keep your hands under them for 10 minutes, it’s still wasting water. I want to talk about all the technological opportunities for sustainability, but there are things we need to do on a personal level to make those technologies work.”

She will also introduce students to an emerging building practice called “passive survivability,” which will allow homes and buildings to function without the assistance of human technology—especially as weather events like heat waves and floods increase, which cut people off from

electricity and clean water.

“The Living Building Challenge is the next step, where buildings are going to produce or collect all of their water and energy from the building site,” she says. “These buildings will be the best of the best when it comes to sustainability. No technology crutches necessary!”

In her Pro Vita course, Govertsen wants to see hands raised. Asking questions, she says, is the first step in changing the tide toward sustainable practices.

“You need to go to facilities, faculty, and administrators and ask, ‘Are you using pesticides? What steps do we need need to take to become plastic free? What are we doing with our trimmings? Can we go paperless? Are we composting our tree limbs?’ It starts with questions, and it often starts with people outside of the system. Some people think sustainability is rude because we often find that sustainability asks experts to reevaluate the way do they do their job. It’s not rude.”

Govertsen continues, “Often times an expert doesn’t see the opportunities for sustainable growth in their own system because s/he are too focused on completing the task and they require that outside perspective. They need a student to ask them questions so the conversation of sustainability can begin. Change is never going to be easy. If it was easy, it would be changed already. Someone has to ignite the change, so it might as well be you.”