May 2015
Sustainability Bulletin
The UAlbany Students for Sustainability volunteered for I Love My Parks Day. They spent a sunny Saturday building trails and removing invasive plants
Sustainability Coordinators and students enjoyed a trip to Wellington Farm to sample their delicious teas and learn about sustainable agricultural practices.
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Heritage Garden Happenings Terra Awards
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Destination Green
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Family Earth Day
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Around Town
Heritage Garden Happenings
On April 23rd, students marked the official opening of the Heritage Garden with a vine cutting ceremony. Despite the cold and light snow, over thirty students came out to celebrate the first planting season. The garden will be planted with seeds that represent the culture of four distinct time periods in Albany, modeled after the four uptown quads: Indian, Dutch, Colonial, and State. To get involved, email gogreen@albany.edu.
Graduate student Lisa Cassidy posed with Mohawk storyteller Kay Olan, who shared a traditional blessing at the Heritage Garden on Earth Day.
Director of Environmental Sustainability Mary Ellen Mallia, with the assistance of undergrads, planted a native chokeberry bush. The bush was featured at Earth and Wellness Day, where students, staff, and faculty hung leaf ornaments on which they wrote a favorite element of their own heritage.
Dr. Chris Pastore’s American History class visited the Heritage Garden on April 28th to assist with planting and basic maintenance. Sophomore James Rath first gave an overview of the garden planning process before students got their hands dirty.
The Terra Awards Each semester, the Office of Environmental Sustainability awards one faculty member, one staff member, and multiple students a Terra Award to recognize their individual commitments to advancing sustainability on campus. Take a moment to read about the dedication and achievements of a few of UAlbany’s outstanding individuals.
Undergraduate Student: James Rath In only two years as a Great Dane, James has taken on an impressive leadership role in the student sustainability movement. As a member of the Environmental Health and Sustainability LLC, he developed an understanding of the value of local food and clean energy. Then, as he began his sophomore year, he assumed the role of Bike Share Assistant on Indian Quad, where he helped more than double the usage. Additionally, James served as the intern for the 3R RecycleMania Challenge, in which UAlbany won national recognition.
Undergraduate Student: Nadia Rodriguez Nadia is a junior biology major who has served on the Student Sustainability Council as a Recycling Chair for the past year. She wrangles volunteers to collect plastic bottles at all the UAlbany Basketball home games and helps plan outreach programs for RecycleMania. This year, Nadia co-chaired a research project to demonstrate the best type and placement of recycling bins for the University Library. Additionally, Nadia served on the Trashion Fashion committee, where she was deemed the "student sustainability guru."
Graduate Students: Tom Wolcott and Krista Bentson Krista and Tom have made a significant impact in furthering sustainability initiatives in businesses throughout NYS. As part of a funded grant from NYS Department of Environmental Conservation, they developed a website, GreenBizToolkit, that codifies and explains sustainability programs, grants and funding for both for profit and not for profit organizations. This website is now being promoted by various organizations across the state.
Staff: Mary McCarthy Mary has been active in the sustainability movement since she joined the UAlbany family in fall 2012 and served as the Residence Hall Director for the Sustainability Themed House for second year students. She proposed and helped implement the popular Trashion Fashion Show, which challenges students to create an ensemble from recycled or reclaimed materials, which came to fruition for the first time in spring 2014. Though Mary now works as an academic advisor, she volunteered her time this spring to ensure that the second annual show was as successful as the first.
Faculty: Dr. Kendra Smith-Howard Dr. Kendra Smith-Howard, a faculty member in the History Department, has been involved in the sustainability movement for several years, immersing herself in moving curriculum and academic advancements forward by participating in the Task Force on Environmental Sustainability as well as the academic working group that developed the sustainability minor. Her research focuses on environmental history, and she recently published the book Pure and Modern Milk: An Environmental History since 1900. Kendra is also a key person behind the creation and maintenance of the Sustainability Roundtable, an initiative that allows faculty and graduate students to share and discuss their research.
Destination
Green
On April 22nd, UAlbany hosted Destination Green 2015, an Alternative Fuel Vehicle Showcase This provided students, faculty, staff, and visitors with a chance to view applications of alternative fuels, advanced vehicle technologies, and other petroleum reduction strategies being undertaken by members of the Clean Cities Coalition in the Capital Region. The vehicles on display included: a UAlbany hybrid electric bus, GEM electric car and Zero Emission truck, CDTA hybrid bus, Hoosick Valley school district propane bus, RPI electric parking enforcement vehicle, National Grid and Albany Airport Compressed Natural Gas vehicles and Coca Cola hybrid delivery truck. Zip Car, Capital Car Share, and Bikeable UAlbany were also on hand to provide information on this services. This event allowed the University to support the Capital District Clean Communities Coalition’s objective to provide knowledge and promote the Capital Region’s economic, environmental, and energy security by advocating for the use of alternative fuels, advanced vehicle technologies & policies that reduce petroleum consumption in transportation. In 2013 the University at Albany displaced over 12,000 gallons of petroleum through its hybrid bus fleet, electric vehicle charging stations, car share and bike share programs, and other initiatives. The event served to demonstrate that reducing petroleum use and creating a more sustainable Capital Region is a team effort, and everyone shares the responsibility.
Family Earth Day Over 100 people came to celebrate UAlbany’s Third Annual Family Earth Day sponsored by the Department of Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences on April 19th. The event featured a wide range of family friendly activities including a land planning challenge; a composting station; glaciers: then and now visual; arctic creatures mobiles, and a traveling nitrogen game. In addition, there were demos on creating a cloud in a bottle and making smores from a solar oven. The highlight was the launching of two weather balloons from Collins Circle.
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Earth and Welln 1. Graduate student Mike Antidormi displays his research at the student poster session.
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2. The Food not Bombs of Albany, New York group collects food from bakeries and grocery stores to create community meals for the needy. 3. The UAlbany Employee Assistance Program (EAP) offers support to employees and promotes a healthy state of mind and well being - both in and out of the workplace. 4. The Radix Ecological Sustainability Center promotes ecological literacy, environmental stewardship, and sustainable technologies through educational programs. 5. Students “rocked the bike� to make pedal powered smoothies, courtesy of Sodexo. 6. The Student Sustainability Council serves as the advisory board for the Office of Environmental Sustainability on all student initiatives. 7 . The EAP Community Service Project set a goal of creating 150 potholders to donate to Grassroots Givers.
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On April 23, EAP and The Office of Environmental Sustainability held the annual Earth and Wellness Day. This year’s theme focused on “Our Heritage: The Root of What Sustains Us.” A variety of exhibitors demonstrated how our culture, history, and “roots” are an important aspect of overall health and well -being and means of creating a sense of community. The event featured community exhibitors including: Historic Albany Foundation, Iroquois Museum, Radix Center, Cornell Cooperative Extension, and many, many more. Special thanks to all exhibitors, UAS, and the Earth and Wellness Day committee team who made the event possible!
ness Day 2015 Earth and Wellness Day also featured a photo contest. On the right is the winner of the student/alumni category, submitted by junior Ellen Liebenthal. Below is the faculty/staff entry, submitted by Pascale Maximin, a counselor in the Educational Opportunities Program. Congrats to both winners!
This spring, Residential Life formed sustainability committees on each quad and in the apartments to bring large scale sustainability programs for the residents. Enjoy a glimpse into the creative ways students learn about sustainability outside of the classroom.
State Quad: Unless Garden On Sunday March 8th, students engaged in a campus-wide initiative to contribute and give back to the Albany community by continuing UAlbany's "Go Green" initiative. Over the course of three weeks, the committee members collected recyclable items including paper, plastic, and recyclable bottles. On the programming date, an art project made of collected materials was made by the committee members with the help of participating students. The resulting project was called the "Unless" Garden, inspired from the Dr. Seuss quote in The Lorax: “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not.� Tabling in front of the State Quad Dining hall, the committee members were able to make a physical display out of recycled materials on the wall in the shape of a tree. Students then took a sustainability pledge and received a planter to grow forget-me-nots in their room. With the use of multiple flyers and social media, over one-hundred students participated in the program.
Dutch Quad: Getting Crafty On Saturday, April 18th, the Sustainability Committee on Dutch Quad planned a program around arts and crafts with the aim to introduce residents to the ways that we can transform “wasteful� materials into more sustainable everyday household items. For example, they made funky zipper cases from plastic bottles, supplying zipper straps and hot glue. Another activity featured was the creation of yarn letters that could be a room decoration. The desired letter was cut from reused cardboard and then wrapped with yarn. The third activity was the fashioning of duct tape wallets., which could be used for actual wallets and SUNY card holders. The event also featured cotton candy and popsicles for residents to enjoy in the hot afternoon. Not only was the program focused on environmentally friendly initiatives, it also strove to build a positive atmosphere for residents to socialize and de-stress before finals.
Colonial Quad: Recycle Madness During the month of March, the Colonial Quad Sustainability Committee hosted Recycle Madness to heighten resident excitement for recycling and sustainability. The event was complete with a recycle shootout station, upcycling tables, green trivia, a Trashion Fashion inspiration station, and a recycling competition. This event helped save approximately 348 recyclable items from entering landfills, in addition to educating about hundred students and staff members about the importance of living "green" daily with some real sustainability trivia and fun activities. Hamilton Hall residents were the winners of the recycle competition at Recycle Madness and were awarded for their green efforts with a pizza party!
Apartments: Earth and Wellness Day On Saturday, April 25th from 1-3pm on Liberty Terrace, University Apartments, the Office of Environmental Sustainability and University Auxiliary Services celebrated the 3rd Annual Earth Day Food and Art Festival. Attendees enjoyed many activities such as canvas painting, henna, performances, local food samples, toilet paper roll art, tee-shirt bag making, and lip balm making and received mason jars as a sustainable giveaway. A special thank you goes out to the UAlbany Students for Sustainability who hosted the very popular Aquatic Ecojar Making station and to Joel Tirado, founder of Sustainability Education and Entrepreneurial Development in Schools (SEEDS), who demonstrated how to make a worm composting box. The committee would also like to acknowledge and thank the organizations and businesses that supported this event: Honest Weight, UAlbany Dining, The Brakes Coffeehouse & Provisions, Whole Foods, Field Goods, Price Chopper, the Pottery Place, the Cheesecake Factory, Lorraine-Michaels Dance Center, the Palace Theatre and Hooperevolution.
Alumni Quad: Earth Day Celebration The Sustainability Committee on Alumni designated the entire month of April to collecting recyclable items! They began on April 1st, developing a schedule in which they could collect recyclable materials from the residents of Alumni Quad. In exchange for a donation, each resident would receive a raffle ticket for each item donated. The resident was then able to cash in these raffle tickets at our April 22nd Alumni Quad ‘Earth Day Celebration’ program for the chance to win four “go – green” themed gift baskets and two gift cards. Chevan, one of the committee members, taught residents how to create origami art using recycled paper. They also had a seed planting station and games constructed with recyclable materials. One was a bowling game made of stress balls and soda cans. The other game was a “corn-haul” type game with a board made of cardboard along with handmade bean bags. By the end of the program, they collected over 1800 pieces of recyclable material!
NYS Library Local History Tour
Secrets of the Co-op Cafe
The New York State Library is a treasure chest of resources for those tracing their family histories. On Saturday, May 23rd, join a tour highlighting published genealogies, local histories, church records, Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) records, United States and New York State Census records, newspapers on microfilm, city directories and more. Shawn Purcell, subject specialist for genealogy and local history at the New York State Library, will lead the tour. Registration is required. To register online, go to http:// www.nysl.nysed.gov/programs/ or email NYSLTRN@nysed.gov.
One of the most popular and in-demand classes is back on Thursday, May 21st at 6PM! Sample some of The Co-op CafÊ’s most popular seasonal salads and learn how to duplicate them at home, using the best ingredients and techniques. Skilled chefs will share their secrets, and let you in on how they come up with delicious offerings every day at Honest Weight.
Kanatsiohareke Strawberry Festival Celebrate the strawberry harvest with the Kanatshiohareke Mohawk Community on the weekend of June 27-28 (event runs from 10-6 on each day). Make new friends, see old friends, share traditions, and learn about the Mohawk culture! Enjoy traditional Iroquois music, dance, food, storytelling, and arts and crafts. The fest will be held at 4934 State Highway 5, Fonda, NY (one hour west of Albany between exits 28 & 29 off I-90). For more information, visit www.mohawkcommunity.com.
Troy’s 16th Annual Hidden Garden Tour On May 21st from 4PM-7:30PM, enjoy a self-guided walking tour of backyard gardens in the Historic Sage, Washington Park and adjoining districts in downtown Troy. Required check-in near Russell Sage College parking lot, corner of First and Division streets. FOR INFORMATION ABOUT TOUR For information, call (518) 874-1303 or email haliskim@verizon.net.