Description
The UChicago Green Fund is an initiative started by the UChicago Environmental Alliance and Campus and Student Life to increase student engagement with sustainability. Through grants provided by the UChicago Green Fund, students are able to pursue rigorous, collaborative, and impactful projects to improve campus sustainability.
The UChicago Green Fund is in its second year. However, projects already funded aim to provide off-campus students access to affordable recycling, support efforts to reduce power consumption in the UChicago Data Center using the Midway HPC Computing Cluster, as well as catalyze a Sustainable Pritzker initiative for residential composting among other funded ideas.
Established in Autumn 2019, the UChicago Environmental Alliance (UCEA) is an association of environmental student organization leadership at The University of Chicago that is helping to administer the Green Fund. We seek to raise awareness of environmental issues and to promote sustainability among the wider campus community to create lasting change at the University.
The following list includes the student groups currently represented in UCEA (listed alphabetically):
• Committee on Campus Sustainability
• Environmental Justice Task Force
• Environmental Research Group
• UChicago Impact Investing Group
• Paul Douglas Institute
• Phoenix Sustainability Initiative
• Student Government
If these environmental initiatives and direct student action resonate with you, we would greatly appreciate your support and voice to turn this program into a continual facet of the UChicago community!
Donations are applied to...
100% of your support will go towards student-led initiatives and opportunities to improve UChicago’s sustainability. Your support will provide students the ability to engage with faculty mentors, administrators, and staff to reduce UChicago’s environmental footprint.
The entire University will benefit, especially the future generations of UChicago. Faculty, staff, and students will be able to enjoy a more sustainable environment along with a stronger community. Furthermore, this is one step in hopefully making UChicago a leader in the environmental field.
Personal Message
The UChicago Green Fund, jointly run by student leadership and Dean Rasmussen, is in its second year. With your help last year, the UChicago Green Fund has funded projects that introduced residential composting programs for off-campus College undergraduates and Pritzker medical students, distributed free reusable menstrual cups to students, promoted pipette tip recycling in the Cummings Life Science Centre (CLSC), as well as increased energy efficiency in the UChicago Data Center.
The student board of the UChicago Green Fund wants to ensure that this sustainability push and momentum continue long after we graduate. Your support will show that the campus community is highly engaged and supportive of the Green Fund, ensuring the program’s existence for future generations of UChicago scholars.
Additionally, stay engaged with the work of the UChicago Environmental Alliance and the UChicago Green Fund through future alumni magazine articles and our Facebook page!
UChicago Green Fund: https://csl.uchicago.edu/life-on-campus/green-fund/
UChicago Environmental Alliance: https://www.facebook.com/UChicagoEnvironmentalAlliance/
Why are donations necessary?
Do you believe that UChicago is a model for campus sustainability? Do you believe we can be?
We believe that UChicago lags behind in sustainability at this moment. Compared to peer institutions, such as Yale, Dartmouth, Harvard, and Loyola which already provide students extensive opportunities to improve campus sustainability, UChicago students do not have the resources to remain effectively engaged in sustainability nor are environmental issues sufficiently visible in the community.
The UChicago Green Fund aspires to change this by allowing ambitious students to pursue campus sustainability projects with a collaborative focus for a greener future. We believe that the support of alumni is integral in making this change a reality, and we believe that the momentum for the environment is there. However, we need your help in ensuring that our collective voice is heard.
The Green Fund, which piloted in the 2020-21 academic year, is a pool of $50,000 whose purpose is to catalyze sustainability research and projects by UChicago undergraduate and graduate students. The UChicago Environmental Alliance (UCEA) — a representative group of undergraduate environmental student groups on campus — has worked with the Dean of Students in the University, Michele Rasmussen, and the Office of Campus and Student Life to make the Green Fund a reality. The aim of the Green Fund is to reduce the environmental impacts of campus life.
The $50,000 pool is stewarded by an extensive, revolving system of reviewers. The broader first-round Review Board consists of numerous experienced faculty, staff, and student members. Following the initial project screening, the Decision Board consists of three faculty/staff, three undergraduate students, and three graduate students which rotate yearly. These students are chosen through a highly selective application process facilitated by the UChicago Environmental Alliance. Therefore, the Green Fund actively engages the entirety of the campus community in sustainability efforts, both on the funding and the receiving side.
With your financial donations, we will be able to convey to the University our strong commitment to sustainability. We will be able to fund future student projects to improve the community we call home. We will be able to take an important first-step in the right, green direction.
Please donate today and have your voice for a more sustainable future heard!