New Life

I have excuses. So many excuses. Here’s how they go: I really intended to be a good blogger, but then there is life. In between a new home, a new puppy, a new job, blogging fell by the wayside. But, there is more newness: a new garden!

Therefore, we can talk about new things! Is that a good enough excuse for the hiatus?

Here’s what I’m harvesting:
Carrots: Tendersweet and Nantes
Kale: Dino
Cilantro
Lettuce: Brune d’hiver
Broccoli: mystery!
Peas: super mystery! (I got the seeds at the National Heirloom Expo in Santa Rosa, which I highly recommend you attend too).

Here’s what I have planted, either in beds already or in pots:
Beans: French fillet
Garlic: boring white, Purple Glazer, Bogatyr
Onions: torpedo, Walla Walla, and some other mysteries
Cabbage: Golden acre
Leek: Extra large Carentan
Parsnip: All American
Melons: Collective Farm Woman (big hopes for this one), Hale’s Best 45, Melon Ananas Amerique
Winter Squash: Kikuza, Jarrahdale, New England Sugar Pie, Burgess Buttercup
Summer Squash: Striata D’Italia, Table Dainty
Cukes: Suyo Long, De Bourbonne, Mexican Sour Gherkin
Tomatoes: San Marzano, Reisetomate (crazy looking!), Gezahnte, Ox heart, Cherokee Purple, Candy Sweet, Ananas Noire
Spicy Peppers: Thai Burpa, Yellow Cayenne, Shishito, Sante Fe Grande, Pasilla Bajio
Sweet Pepper: Italian Pepperchini, Red Mini, Jimmy Nardello

Perennials:
Artichoke: Purple Globe
Rhubarb
Black Currant: Ben Sarek
White Currant: Pink Champagne
Late season Raspberry: Taylor
Summer bearing Black berry: triple crown
Fruit Salad Tree with grafts of plum, yellow peach, white peach, and nectarine
Santa Rosa Plum
Hardy Kiwi (different than regular kiwi, “fur-less” and small)
Meyer Lemon
Two types of Grapes

And don’t even get me started on the flower garden. See, I have been busy!
Here’s how I’ve been dealing with the loads of peas I’ve been picking lately:
For this recipe, you will need:
2 large handfuls of fresh peas, picked over, rinsed, and stringed if necessary
2 cloves garlic
Juice of 1 lime
2 tablespoons soy sauce, tamari, or Bragg’s

Tools:
Steaming Basket (aka, space ship!)
Pot with a lid the steamer fits in
Timer
Knife
Cutting board
Salad bowl
Garlic press
Lemon reamer or other juicing device
Measuring spoons or the willingness to guess

Process:
1. Put the salad bowl (preferably not plastic) in the fridge.
2. Rinse the peas and string them if need be. If you never strung peas before, here’s a quick primer: find the stem end and pull towards the opposite end so a fiber pulls away from the pod. Repeat, ad nasuem. Obviously, this is better with another mental stimulation going on. Might I suggest The Young Turks?
3. Start heating 1 inch of water in the pot and cover about five minutes before you think you will be finished stringing peas
4. Pile the peas into the steamer and place in the now boiling steam bath. Set the timer for 2 minutes.
5. Remove the peas immediately and place in the cold salad bowl.
6. Add the garlic (remember, no peeling necessary if you use a garlic press!), lime juice, and soy sauce.
7. Enjoy with your lovers and friends!

 

My job is to help the CSSC outreach to new organizations on and off campus. Once a relationship with a new organization is made I also help to keep them in the loop with what we are doing.

 

PAST ROLES: Co-Convergence Coordinator
SCHOOL: Butte College
MAJOR
: Environmental Science
HOMETOWN:
Chico, CA

 

About Me

Ben Johnson is a student at Butte Community College just outside of Chico, California where he was born and raised. If you have ever lived in Chico you can easily see the vibes of the town in the personality of Ben. He enjoys reading, riding his bike, music, yoga, meandering through the park and walking in the farmers market.

How I Got Involved In CSSC

Knowledge of the world around him has always been apparent to Ben. But not until listening to his first System of a Down, Rage against the Machine or even Talking Heads album that i wanted to take action. After a few semester at Butte he met a furry faced friend who is known as Morgoth in this dimension and others, he introduced Ben to his gateway club formally know as SAS(Student Alliance for Sustainability). The following semester they formally turned into a chapter of the CSSC. The next semester Ben went to his first Convergence in SLO and the following summer he attended his first leadership retreat at which we volunteered to host a convergence at Butte College with a stellar team.

The Area of Sustainability That Interests Me Most

Late at night Ben thinks of many aspects of Sustainability, passing the grounds of his mansion to best figure out the answer to the questions of how to save the world. A born Environmentalist he usually takes into account the many relationships between world around us and the meddling of humans. Although we humans are part of this world we may not knowledge that as a society. Along with the environment i believe in us humans to do good, to enjoy each other and life itself without the need for violence and inequalities. I believe so sustain us our Social and Economic are very important. So the same as not having a favorite color, the relationships of the difference areas of Sustainability is what motivated Ben.

The Role of Student Action in Sustainability

The 60′s were a very important time in American history and also other parts of the world. The students started speaking up against injustices and wrongs in the world. The voice of the students were being heard but then they went quiet. Not until recently voices of this generation were gathering and connecting through new technologies to face the wrongs and injustices of our generation. Problems without solutions are just now being acted upon to find those answers and the younger generations are the one to lead us to a new world. Although we must work with every generation, students must unite to create a lasting vision that we want to see in the future, instead of a stale view from the past.

Sustainability Projects I’ve Worked On

  • Fall 2012 Convergence,
  • Peace Bench, Ban Fracking,
  • Recycling,
  • Ending the War on Drugs,
  • Prop 32
  • Green Fund
  • Campus Compost

CSSC is Looking for Interns!

Our organization is growing both in size and impact. We are expanding our reaches into more aspects of sustainability and at the same time are gaining much momentum for our campaigns and programs. The sustainability movement is being lead by students like you and me and CSSC is at the forefront of the California student sustainability movement. We would like to invite more passionate, dedicated and motivated students to share their talents in contribution to our collective goals.

Please apply by March 15th. We will be selecting our interns by April 1st.

Two Positions Have Opened Up for Spring 2013!

Internship Credit Details

  • Arrange an internship with your college department
  • We will work with you to establish your specific duties and tasks
  • You provide the necessary documentation and send it to the Operating Team Co-Chairs
  • Operating Team Co-Chairs will sign off on your hours and duties for verification

 

To find more info and to Apply click HERE

What Happened on February 17th?

I’ll tell you!

It was a great rally on Sunday Feb 17th! Attending the San Francisco solidarity march was a powerful event, which brought folks from many different movements together to demonstrate in the streets of America. While the block we marched around was packed with protesters, some 40,000 people showed up to protest in Washington DC. Ironically as the largest climate rally in US history was in full force outside the White House President Obama was golfing with oil executives. You can write a letter to Obama concerning his untimely golfing event Here. While his actions are not surprising, despite his recent use of climate change and renewable energy rhetoric, he is yet to take any measurable steps forward on addressing climate change and the inevitable decline of this petroleum based economie. Many are looking at his decision regarding the approval of the Keystone XL pipeline as the truest test of his genuine effort to move away from fossil fuels.

Melody Leppard, Tommy Diestel and myself went to the rally about two hours earlier than the start time to get orientated on how to be a volunteer for chant coordinating. In an article by the SF Gate “Tommy Diestel, a student of Butte College, held a megaphone and led some of the thousands of people who marched near the Embarcadero in San Francisco during a climate rally on Feb. 17, in his favorite chant, ‘Don’t frack with California’. Way to go Tommy!

At the SF rally folks from many different backgrounds were coming together in common cause, especially notable were representative of Idle No More, Anti- Fracking activists, pro renewable energy champions, and undoubtedly members of the CSSC. An event becomes so much more powerful when it is joined by activists from what may be apparently different backgrounds. This kind of collaboration of ideas seeks to find solutions that meets everyone’s needs. We all know that at times we can feel alone and alienated within the movement, yet standing, marching and chanting knowing that a team of over 40,000 has taken to the streets was empowering and inspirational. If you were not able to make it to the rally check out these videos on Forward on Climate Change. Bill McKibbin and Van Jones really pull the message together. And I will see Y’all out there next time!

-Kevin Killion

How Gamification can make the world a more sustainable place

Gamification Sustainability

Gamification for a better world

We are living in a world where what we “should” do is often times different from things we “want to” do. This holds true for Sustainability - often times the things you need to do to be sustainable is not necessarily what is the most convenient or comfortable to do.

This is where gamification comes in. So what is gamification? Gamification is the craft of applying all the fun and exciting activities of games, and applying them to non-game serious activities. People have successfully gamified many industries, including education, legal, product design, human resources, and yes, sustainability.

If you dig deep down into games, you will see that most games are simply about doing the same activities - whether it be killing similar monsters, solving new puzzles, or just clicking a button - over and over again for hours.

In the real world, this is called grunt-work.

However, millions of people are addicted to playing games because of the innate design that makes these repetitive tasks fun and exciting: spontaneous results after the completion of tasks, tracking one’s growth and progress in a visual fashion, applying things to a epic meaning and calling, and playing socially with others.

Because of those game mechanics, a player can spend countless days and nights on a game in order to build a better character, prettier avatar, or bigger city. Gamification is simply deriving those fascinating elements within games and applying them into boring activities that make the world better and more productive.

Some of the most common game elements include: points, badges, leaderboards, quests and challenges. These give the users quick feedback and make their progress more visible and entertaining so they can feel motivated in accomplishing their tasks. There are also a variety of Gamification Frameworks out there that are very useful for designing something more holistic.

Gamification can be a powerful tool for sustainability because it can combine meaning with fun by making the process of protecting our planet more entertaining, social and rewarding.

Real World Examples of Gamification

There are many Gamification Examples in Sustainability. Below are a couple examples of how products utilize gamification to move the sustainability envelope forward.

Trash Tycoon: Upcycle and Build a Dream Town of Yours!

Trash Tycoon is an online social network game developed by Guerillapps. It is the first upcycling game on Facebook and has got over 300,000 players within a month since its release. Players in the game can upcycle trash found in the town to create new items that can be sold for game money, which can be used to purchase new items to decorate their town.

Players can also choose to partner up with their friends to clean up trash and create their own dream town. By having players cooperate collectively accomplish tasks bonds the players more closely together.

But unlike other recycling games that are mostly about preaching the importance of recycling, Trash Tycoon is about having fun playing the game with an implicit focus on the education. That is one of the reasons why it attracts so many players because people want to have fun when they play a game.

In addition, Trash Tycoon partners with Treehugger.com by donating 10% of its revenues earned from players’ purchases of . By knowing that playing the game can help the real world gives player a calling to team up friends to be a true hero to create a better virtual and real world.

RecycleBank Makes Recycling Fun and Rewarding

RecycleBank is another good example of implementing recycling through fun. Each year there are over 195 million tons of trash created in the U.S. Most of the trashes need to go into landfills. But the problem is that many of the trashes take over 100 to 400 years to decompose and the availability of the landfills are limited and running out.

In 2010, there were around 1,900 landfills remained. But between 1998 and 2010, there were around 600 landfills being filled, which means that every year, there are 50 less landfills available. According to this diminishing rate, it is not hard to see that within the next 40 years, we would be in huge trouble.

RecycleBank was founded by Patrick K. FitzGerald and Ron Gonen back in 2004. Its mission is to make our world a better place by recycling more waste. It rewards people with redeemable points for recycling their trash, playing quizzes, and saving energy.

People can use the points earned in exchange with goods at places like WalMart, Macy’s, Amazon, and many other places. Currently it has over 300 communities in the U.S. with over 4 million members participating together to recycle their wastes.

Opower: How much Better Can You be at Conserving the Energy?

Our daily life relies heavily on the energy to power the machines we use. In order to produce enough energy for the machines to run, many resources are consumed. Opower company, a privately held company founded by Dan Yates and Alex Laskey in 2007, partners with more than 75 utilities internationally and creates individualized energy reports for more than 15 millions homes around the world.

In the reports it shows the energy consumption for each household and compares that with the neighbors , as well as offers energy saving tips to help households cut down their consumption. The result of peer comparison helped household save 2% in their energy bill.

According to the Opower web, it has helped save over 2 terawatt hours of energy in the U.S. on January 2013. The amount of energy saved on the energy bill is enough to support 2,000 kids through college or to support 40,000 U.S. families with sizes of four people for a year.

There are many more examples of how gamification can help peoples’ lives, even in fields like acupuncture or regions like North Korea. As long as there is human motivation, there is gamification.

Sustainability of a Gamified Life

This planet is ours to protect, whether we feel like it or not. Gamification is a great tool to make people enjoy doing what they have to do for future generations to come, and seeing short-term benefits and rewards while doing it. It empowers everyone to take part in the movement, live a better life, and have fun in the progress.

How can you gamify your life to make it more sustainable?

Our New Community Survey

We want to hear from YOU.

snowflake

The CSSC is a community and this community has needs. So to better serve those needs, we are asking current students to fill out this survey. This information collected will help the CSSC meet the needs of student organizers across our state and shape our upcoming steps for the year.

 

So if you want to help-out click here and spend a few minutes to fill out the survey!

2013 Winter Leadership Retreat

 

 

The CSSC leadership retreats are a space for leaders working on sustainability initiatives on their campuses to come together with other leaders working on similar projects throughout the state

During breakout sessions and workshops retreat attendees have the ability to shape the CSSC by setting goals for the organization and policies to help achieve those goals. Those who attend are also able to and encouraged to become part of the leadership of the CSSC whether that’s in the Operating Team or council.

Our Winter Leadership retreat took from the 17th of January to the 21st at Dancing Deer Farm in Templeton. True to the name of our host’s farm every morning while cooking breakfast in the amazing kitchen provided for us we had an amazing view through the windows that allowed us to see deer frolicking at the bottom of the valley.

Starting Friday morning those who arrived early help build a vermiculture or worm composting bin for our hosts. After a day of hard work a wonderful dinner was prepared that lead into a wonderful square dance, line dance lesson hosted by our own Steve Varhoven and Meredith Jacobsen. Saturday morning began with a great breakfast created by fabulous cooks that moved into a visioning of the next steps for the CSSC and what we as students and members of the world wide community would like to see the world look like, and how the CSSC can help get us there. This discussion lead us into another amazing meal or two before we began on creating goals that help get us and the CSSC moving towards these new visions. The major voice that came out of these discussions was the fact that the CSSC needs to work harder to include two E’s of sustainability that haven’t made much of an appearance within the organization. These two are Economy and Equity because the CSSC is mostly made up of environmental organizations these two E’s have been over shadowed by the third E which stands for Environmental. Saturdays’ work ended with Operating team elections with many new faces joining the Operating team that it looks like it will be a very productive cycle. One of the most important election is that of our Convergence Coordinator, and to this role we elected Zen Trenholm for the upcoming Berkeley Convergence the date is already set for April 26th-28th(So stay tuned!). Sunday lead us into discussions of how to better integrate the aspects of Equity and Economy into the CSSC.

Every retreat has a touching moment for me and this retreat had many but what stood out to me the most was the moment that I realized all the work that I have done on my campus has finally turned into something. Since I joined the CSSC it has been a grueling process to get people from my school involved, so on Saturday night when I stepped out of the kitchen to take a break from cooking dinner to listen in to the elections and heard both of the people I had brought from school become new members of the Operating Team I had to take a second to catch myself as I was flooded with joy.

All in all this was one of the most productive retreats I’ve been to with some of the most amazing people I’ve ever met. As always it’s a reenergizing, revitalizing, reconnecting, love filled food filled learning, teaching and growing experience!

Love and Pizza

Forward on Climate-National Call and Rally Roundup!


FEBRUARY 7 - Lots of amazing things happening around the nation, as young people are jumping into the new year in a really big way! Join us for national calls, and make a stand for bold climate action at solidarity rallies in LA, SF, and SD! More details after the jump.

FORWARD ON CLIMATE VIDEO

First things first:

Join us tonight for what’s sure to be an inspirational national call with our partners at the Energy Action Coalition as we launch what’s bound to be a huge year for the youth sustainability movement! Featuring the Sierra Club’s Michael Brune, Idle No More’s Crystal Lameman, and student organizers of the Power Up! National Divestment Convergence, this is one you’re going to want to listen in on. RSVP now, and join us at 5:00PM PST. The number is (916) 235-1003 and passcode: 655362# OR 475172#.

You might have heard about the HUGE “Forward on Climate” rally planned by 350.org, Sierra Club and Hip Hop Caucus for February 17th in Washington D.C.-the largest climate rally in history!

We encourage everyone to attend the D.C. rally (http://act.350.org/signup/presidentsday), but for those unable to make the journey you can still stand in solidarity and make history right here in California.

Interested? There are three rallies here at home, here’s bound to be one near you—Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Diego. Join forces with members of over 100 environmental, human rights, and social justice organizations to demand action on climate change!

 

Los Angeles:
Where: Olvera Street - Paseo De La Plaza
When: Sunday, February 17, 2013 @1:00PM - 3:00PM
INFO & RSVP: http://www.wilderutopia.com/politics/forward-on-climate-february-17th-rally-in-dc-and-los-angeles/
FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/events/545359235484063/

San Francisco:
Where: 1 Market Street (next to the Embarcadero BART, map)
When: Sunday, February 17, 2013 @1:00PM - 3:00PM
INFO & RSVP: http://action.sierraclub.org/site/Calendar?id=167121&view=Detail

San Diego
Where: Mission Bay Park Visitors Center, Mission Bay Dr & Clairemont Dr, San Diego CA 92109
When: Sunday, February 17, 2013 @1:00PM - 3:00PM
INFO & RSVP: http://sandiego350.org/ai1ec_event/keystone-pipeline-protest/?instance_id=
TWITTER: https://twitter.com/SanDiego350

Can’t attend? Want to do more? Call all your friends and ask them to come! Also stay tuned for phone bank information to help remind folks in the D.C. area about the rally.

Got any questions? Email [email protected] and we can help you recruit at your campus, publicize the events, and find transportation. Hope to see you there!

 

Ambrosia Krinsky, Online Content Co-Manager

PAST ROLES: External Convergence Coordinator
SCHOOL: UC Berkeley
MAJOR
: B.A. Society & Environment, B.A. Media Studies
HOMETOWN:
Magalia, CA

Kori Lay, Regional Event Coordinator, Central Coast

SCHOOL: UCSB, 6/2014
MAJOR
: Chemistry and Enviromental Studies
HOMETOWN:
Port Washington

About Me

When I was in elementary school, my brothers told me that their favorite animals were tigers and lions. Upon hearing this, I asked them what animal could beat a tiger and a lion in a fight. My brother said a polar bear, and ever since then my favorite animal has been a polar bear! I think it is quite fitting because I am very passionate about environmental issues and polar bears are often connected with climate change. My dream is to save the polar bears :)

How I got Involved with the CSSC

I went to the convergence at Butte and fell in love with the mission and the community of CSSC!

 

Area of Sustainability That Interests Me Most

I am most interested in the environmental aspect of sustainability. The earth is everyone’s home and without it we cannot survive. The world is filled with so much beauty and I want to help sustain that beauty!

 

Role of Student Action in sustainability:

Students have so much power on their campus and in their community. When students from various schools come together, their voice grows exponentially and can be heard across the country! With this power comes the responsibility to educate and to provoke change in our institutions and in our communities.

 

Sustainability Projects ive worked on:

I am currently involved in the divestment campaign

Co-Sign The Open Letter To Obama Calling For Bold Climate Action!- 350.org

Help Encourage the President to take action on Climate Change.

 

350.org is calling for everyone to Co-Sign a letter to President Obama to urge ”him to take bold action to confront climate change now.”

With the President’s promise to challenge Climate Change during the inauguration it is now the time to hold him to his promise. Help do this by signing the letter here:

http://act.350.org/signup/an-open-letter-to-president-obama

Save the Date! Strengthening the Roots Seed and Justice Convergence

Hey There!

That’s right, it’s happening once again: the 6th annual Strengthening the Roots Seed and Justice Convergence will be taking place at UC Santa Cruz from February 22-24, 2013.

Maybe you’ve been to a convergence in previous years, and you remember the inspiring speakers, interactive workshops, bomb food, and interesting and excellent people you met there. For the new folks, Strengthening the Roots is a weekend-long student organized event that brings together students, community members, seed savers, gardeners, farmers, and food justice activists to share skills and resources while building relationships with one another.

sustainability and Justice Convergence

This year, some particularly exciting components of the summit include:

~ Speaker Panel on Saturday, February 23 from 7-10pm - including Dr. Vandana Shiva

~ Seed and Culture Exchange - Saturday, February 23 from 5-6:45 pm

~ A series of interactive workshops in seed saving/stewardship, creating local seed library and cooperative networks, creating and managing student-gardens/farms, building beginner farmer programs, and developing fair trade systems.

~ Open spaces for dialogue allowing for participants to actively facilitate discussions and take action on meaningful topics.

Whether you’re new to the food movement or an old hand, this is not an opportunity to be missed!

To Register: please visit this link. Please note that Registration closes Jan. 30th. Make sure to register early!

For updates about the conference and more information about the program, check out our Facebook event.

Questions? email [email protected].

Students Move to Divest at the Claremont “7C’s”

by Hilary Haskell, CSSC Council Member for the Claremont College Consortium

Across the United States, students from various colleges and universities are saying “Yes!” to ask their presidents, deans, and boards of trustees to divest. Recently, this movement spread to the Claremont Consortium of five undergraduate colleges (Claremont McKenna, Harvey Mudd, Pitzer, Pomona, and Scripps) and two graduate universities (Keck Graduate Institute and Claremont Graduate University), collectively known as the “7C’s.” Here, the student movement to make the “7C’s Fossil Free!” by removing their investments in the unsustainable fossil fuels industry began to gain traction earlier this fall.

Bill McKibben, noted climate change expert and author of titles such as Eaarth and Fight Global Warming Now, started 350.org, now one of the main organizations behind the divestment movement. 350 may seem like a strange name for an organization, but remains fundamentally relevant to climate change science: this number signifies the maximum amount of carbon dioxide in parts per million that the atmosphere can reasonably sustain, without drastically altering the future of global climate and the life it supports. Carbon dioxide and stock holdings probably do not seem all that related to one another and rightly so. Divestment is a new tactic to ending dependence on fossil fuels. However, it was utilized in the 1980s to build an effective that ended racial segregation in the form of Apartheid in South Africa. Higher education pledged to end its financial support in companies supporting Apartheid, thus putting economic pressure on South Africa to take legislative measures against the injustice. 350.org and other organizations including the CSSC are now mobilizing this tactic as a means of ending America’s dependence on fossil fuels, by engaging passionate and enthusiastic students.

The California Student Sustainability Coalition runs an “End Coal” campaign that mobilizes students at University of California campuses to push for system-wide divestment from the fossil fuel industry. This campaign started in the summer of 2011 and will likely gain momentum as the divestment movement continues to get nation-wide attention through 350.org’s campaign. If you’d like to learn more about the CSSC’s End Coal campaign or get involved, check out this page on our website.

Already, numerous colleges and universities are joining the divestment efforts. The campaign is gaining national attention, with articles in The Rolling Stone, Huffington Post, and New York Times. These articles recently noted the Claremont colleges and universities for their effective and innovative efforts. Without a doubt, the Claremont Consortium will be able to continue to take the lead in encouraging and taking part in these efforts. Three students from the Claremont Colleges, Jess Grady-Benson (Pitzer, ‘14), Kai Orans (Pomona, ‘14), and Meagan Tokunaga (Pomona, ‘15) have initiated the movement on the Claremont campuses. After leading a rally and attending a presentation by Bill McKibben on November 11th at UCLA as part of 350.org’s “Do the Math Tour”, the Claremont students were motivated to “do the math” themselves based on McKibben’s climate change statistics and work to bring a halt to unsustainable investments and their role in planet-threatening climate change.

Photo credit 350.org

The divestment movement is young - at the Claremont Consortium and at other colleges and universities. After only a few months of action, the students of the Consortium have already made themselves known. To gain initial attention, students tabled at dining halls and in high-traffic areas on campus to raise awareness as well as gain momentum. Then, students gathered together with their newly garnered support to process through the campuses, guided by candle light, chanting “What do we want? Divestment! When do we want it? Now!” and “Divest the West.” During this cross-campus journey, the students also presented letters to the college presidents asking that they put divestment on the agenda for consideration by financial stakeholders. The students plan to meet with Pitzer’s president in January, and the investment committee will review the topic in February. At Pomona, the students have been invited to meet with the Social Responsibility Committee in regards to Divestment. By painting murals that read sayings such as “Fossil Free” and “Divest” on Walker Wall, a highly frequented area of the campuses, there is already a lasting impression. Facebook pages, outreach to clubs related to sustainability, and articles in campus newspapers and magazines have made students realize the importance of divestment. Furthermore, with a new semester approaching and countless students with a variety of different skills and perspectives on board from the Claremont Consortium, the divestment movement promises to bring even more success in the fight against climate change.

If you are interested in more information, please check out the Claremont Colleges Divestment Campaign on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DivestTheClaremontColleges?fref=ts

Or contact Jess Grady-Besnon at [email protected].

Also, please support the efforts by signing the petition here: http://act.gofossilfree.org/sign/Fossil_Free_Claremont/


 

Happy New Year from the CSSC!

2012 was a year full of challenges, triumphs, changes, and new ideas for all of us in the California Student Sustainability Coalition. As we move into 2013, it’s important to reflect on how we can truly be the change we wish to see in the world. All activism and organizing starts within. Here are some New Year’s resolutions from members of the CSSC:

Meredith Jacobson, UC Berkeley: This new year I resolve to be a bridge. I resolve to be a better connector between people of different backgrounds, between different organizations, between different factions and divisions and motives that exist within the same movement toward a better world. The sustainability movement needs more bridges and fewer divides. I resolve to do what I can to be a bridge whenever I can, to connect people and help us all see eye to eye.

Julia Clark, Humboldt State University: I resolve to make a connection with someone in my neighborhood who owns chickens that I could purchase eggs from. Local food is the best!

Kevin Killion, Chico State University: This year will be a year of putting theory into practice. Each day I wish to live intentionally and make the decisions which mindfully bring me closer to genuine fulfillment. I am going to work on limiting my consumption, so that I am more in control of my life and can be more response-able. This year will be about bringing together diverse organizations in common causes, and helping to build the Chico/Butte alliance, with both the youth and our elders. Plan for the worst, Hope for the best, Embrace change and the unexpected, and Accept whatever comes your way. Above all Love Love Love!

Steve Verhoeven, Shasta College: I pledge for the new year of twenty thirteen to take part in the planning and organization of establishing a cooperative/CSA at my school as well as getting my school associated with the Cssc further! Love, peace and trees!

Austin VanDerWouden, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo: My resolution for the year is to continue the progress on my projects at Cal Poly. I want to help our permaculture plot fulfill its potential and maintain the positive atmosphere which it holds. I also plan to do my part it turning the garden at the on-campus apartments into a success by renting a plot and growing some nice plants. I plan on continuing the mentoring program we have where we take children on hikes. I want to be a better mentor by holding more knowledge of nature to pass on to the kids, engaging in less self-destructive habits to be a better example for them, and show them more love. I also hope to get my senior project approved so I can make an examination of the health of Cal Poly’s forest. And hopefully this examination will lead to a healthier forest in the future. I plan to do all this by increasing my mental health, staying positive, not getting distracted by silly things, and by always being grateful for my time on Earth.

Zen Trenholm, UC Berkeley: Work towards a healthy mind, body, and soul. Never stop loving. Live boldly. Live outside of my comfort zones. Make everyone’s lives more enjoyable. Host the most bad-ass convergence, ever. Leave CSSC stronger, more vibrant, and more inclusive than I found it.

What’s your resolution for this fresh new year?

 

Reading, writing and realizing nature: explore your local place this holiday season

Explore your local place this holiday season

I co-facilitate a Continue reading “Reading, writing and realizing nature: explore your local place this holiday season”

Should Chiapas Farmers Suffer for California’s Carbon?

A California proposal would offset the state’s climate-altering emissions by paying for forest conservation in Chiapas. Could there be unintended consequences in a region with a history of human rights abuse and land grabs?

re-posted from Yes! Magazine

“We are not responsible for climate change—it’s the big industries that are,” said Abelardo, a young man from the Tseltal Mayan village of Amador Hernández in the Lacandon jungle of Chiapas. “So why should we be held responsible, and even punished for it?”

Image of San Cristóbal, where the GCF meeting took place, by barenuckleyellow, licensed under Creative Commons.

Abelardo was one of dozens of villagers who had traveled to the city of San Cristóbal de las Casas to protest an international policy meeting on climate change and forest conservation. At a high-end conference center, representatives from the state of California and from states and provinces around the world were working out mechanisms intended to mitigate climate change by protecting tropical forests. The group was called the Governor’s Climate and Forests Task Force (GCF), and California’s interest was in using forest preservation in Chiapas as a carbon offset—a means for meeting climate change goals under the state’s 2006 Global Warming Solutions Act.

Such an agreement among subnational governments is unprecedented, and California officials view it as an important way for the world’s eighth largest economy to help the developing world. But judging from the reaction on the streets of San Cristóbal, Mexican peasants see it differently. The lush, mountainous state of Chiapas has a long history of human rights abuses, and the Mexican government has forcibly evicted indigenous families from their lands in the name of environmental protection. To indigenous peasants in the Lacandon jungle, the pending agreement has all the hallmarks of a land grab.

And such culture clashes over land and forests may become more common: As scientists, economists, and governments worldwide struggle to find solutions to runaway climate change, they are investing in one-size-fits-all financial strategies for emissions reductions in developing countries. These policies tend to ignore local needs, land tenure issues, small-scale economies, cultural practices, and histories. Communities in developing countries are raising concerns that, in some instances, these alleged cures may be worse than the disease.

The GCF was founded in 2009 when 16 states and provinces, from California to Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, and from Cross-River State, Nigeria, to Acre, Brazil, decided to explore ways to implement a program called Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD). REDD is a program intended to fight climate change by stopping deforestation. Under REDD, the industrialized North hopes to offset carbon emissions by paying the global South to preserve forests (which store carbon). Since its acceptance into U.N. climate negotiations in 2005, the program has grown popular among international agencies and governments interested in funding rural development—and has generated fierce resistance among sectors of the rural poor and indigenous peoples.

When indigenous peasant farmers in Chiapas hear that they’ll be paid to stop growing traditional crops and reforest with African palm trees, they see signs of a familiar pattern. And when they’re told that they may have to leave their jungle villages to allow the forest to recover, they’re acutely aware of the ongoing theft of their lands. In Chiapas, both projects—the planting of biofuel crops and the forced resettlement of forest communities—are linked to the local implementation of REDD.

To indigenous peasants in the Lacandon jungle, the pending agreement has all the hallmarks of a land grab.

Agencies and policy leaders acknowledge the tension, but are sometimes dismissive of the depth of the problem. William Boyd, senior advisor to the GCF and a professor of law at the University of Colorado, said, “Any broad public policy is going to generate opposition. We understand that, and we see the need to do a better job at communicating our objectives.” But the problem is not merely communication. It is an issue of fundamentally different ways of viewing the world. León Enrique Ávila, an agronomist and professor of sustainable development at the Intercultural University of Chiapas, sees REDD as “a continuation of the colonial project to do away with the indigenous worldview.”

Ávila’s work is strongly rooted in the indigenous concept of lekil kuxlejal, or el buen vivir—a complex worldview involving harmony among people, the environment, and the ancestors. According to this way of thinking, people are a part of—not apart from—nature. From this perspective, even apparently benign Western notions of wealth, development, conservation, and sustainability are as alien and as hostile as the more recognized ills of consumerism, individualism, and war.

“REDD and projects of this type,” Ávila said, ignore “that nature [has its own] rights, and treat it as a provider of goods and services, a purely economic entity. This perspective is fundamentally hostile to lekil kuxlejal.”

A closely watched partnership

Of numerous REDD projects worldwide, the agreement between California and Chiapas, expected to come online by 2015, is the most advanced, and was the subject of great interest at the Chiapas GCF meeting. “We are all watching the California-Chiapas project closely,” said Iwan Wibisono of the Indonesian National REDD+ Task Force.

In 2006, California passed the Global Warming Solutions Act, which mandates that the state reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2020. Under the act’s implementation plan, approved by the California Air Resources Board in 2011, 15 to 20 percent of the state’s mandated emission reductions will come from a cap-and-trade program that regulates the state’s major industrial polluters. The program allows polluters to meet part of their emissions-reduction targets by purchasing carbon credits. Also known as offsets, these let a company pay someone else to reduce CO2 emissions instead of reducing pollution at the source. Currently, the state only allows offsets in the United States. But if the REDD plan goes through, California companies could pay states in some of the world’s most forested regions not to cut down their trees.

As one of his last acts in office, former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a memorandum of understanding with Chiapas, opening the door for California industries to buy offsets generated there. (Other states working on similar agreements with California include Acre, Brazil, Aceh, Indonesia, and Cross-River State, Nigeria).

Two years later, the protocols for this agreement are still in development by a non-governmental body called the REDD Offsets Working Group, which is expected to release its recommendations before the end of 2012.

Echoes of history

In preparing for the GCF meeting in San Cristóbal, a number of Chiapas-based civil society groups formed a coalition called REDDeldía (the English translation would be “REDD-ellion,” as in “rebellion”), which held a parallel forum denouncing the GCF and REDD. The group’s statement, issued in advance of the GCF meeting, called REDD “the new face, painted green by the climate crisis, of an old and familiar form of colonialism that advances the appropriation of lands and territories through dispossession and forced displacement.” That sentiment was echoed by a similar forum convened in San Cristóbal the same week by La Vía Campesina, the world’s largest federation of peasant farmers.

For groups in Chiapas, these concerns are rooted in recent local history. In 1971, the Mexican government issued a decree that gave about 1.5 million acres of the Lacandon jungle to the Lacandon Maya—one of several ethnic groups that call the region their home—while retaining the rights to exploit timber, minerals, and other resources. A second decree in 1976 made the greater part of the jungle—the area with the richest biodiversity in Mexico—into a UNESCO World Heritage site called the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve.

Along with a few settlements from the Tseltal and Ch’ol ethnic groups, who negotiated their way into the agreement, the nominal owners of this territory were designated “the Lacandon Community.” But the creation of the Lacandon Community came with a political cost: in order to give the Lacandon Maya 1.5 million acres of forest, 26 villages of Tseltal and Ch’ol people—over 2,000 families who had lived there for decades, if not centuries—had to be moved.

After their expulsion, several peasant farmer organizations demanded redress, and the resulting tension between the Lacandon Community and its neighbors made it impossible, for decades, for the Mexican government to successfully demarcate the territory. The demarcation line became known as la brecha Lacandona—“brecha” meaning split, schism, or gap. Some of the expelled communities later coalesced to form the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, the indigenous rebel group that brought Chiapas to the world’s attention with their 1994 uprising. Among the proto-Zapatistas and the other peasant farmer groups in the region in the 1970s, one of the primary political slogans was “No to la brecha Lacandona!”

With REDD, work is underway again to draw la brecha Lacandona. In February, 2011, Chiapas Governor Juan Sabines began distributing payments of 2,000 pesos a month to members of the Lacandon Community as part of the state’s Climate Change Action Program, and the state began expelling “illegal settlers” from the Montes Azules Reserve.

“The jungle was previously occupied by over 900 communities,” Sabines told the GCF at the opening plenary. “Now we have cleared them from the jungle. Today the Reserves are being conserved and protected by their legitimate owners, who will soon have access to the carbon markets.”

Among the communities slated for removal from the jungle is the village of Amador Hernández—1,500 Tseltal Mayan subsistence farmers who escaped plantation servitude in the 1950s to make their homes in bare wooden huts and cultivated scattered cornfields in the area that is now the Montes Azules Reserve. On the first day of the three-day GCF meeting, several campesinos from Amador Hernández and neighboring communities entered the auditorium and requested a few minutes at the microphone. ChiapasState Minister of the Environment and Natural History Fernando Rosas denied their request, telling the community members that they should listen first to the meeting’s proceedings. If they wanted to consider joining the REDD program, the minister told them, he would meet with them at a later date.

Unsatisfied, the campesinos mounted a protest. They handed out flyers declaring, “The government is lying to you—they have neither informed us nor consulted us!” Eufemia Landa Sanchez, a woman from a deforested region on the edge of the Montes Azules Reserve, then took the microphone and read a message to the plenary.

“Transnational businesses have had plans for the rural areas of Chiapas for some time now,” Sanchez said. “The natural wealth of biodiversity and water, of mines, of biofuels, and of course of petroleum, have led to the displacement of people, the poisoning of the earth, and have made the peasant farmer into a serf on his own land. And in every case they blame us and criminalize us. Our supposed crime today is that we are responsible for global warming.

“Why do the wealthy want to impose their will by force?” she continued. “The jungles are sacred, and they exist to serve the people, as God gave them to us. We do not go to your countries and tell you what to do with your lives and your lands. We ask that you respect our lives and our lands, and go back where you came from!”

Hanging in the balance

Insiders in the GCF projected that, given the complexities of linking an emerging market in California to forested lands abroad, and the level of controversy in Chiapas, the Chiapas-California plan has no better than a 50/50 chance of coming to fruition. Aside from the 2010 agreement, no formal protocols have been approved by the two states. And, aside from a $1.5 million grant to the GCF from the U.S. State Department and hope that a so-far hypothetical carbon market will provide some stable cash flow, little funding is on the horizon.

“If we can’t build a $6 million fund to make this happen, then we’ve got to think about other options,” said Boyd. “Among these options, we’re looking at innovative models for leveraging private sector investment.”

After enduring years of toxic dumping and rising cancer rates, indigenous Ecuadorians took oil giant Chevron to court to fight for the life of the rainforest—and its people.

Three weeks after the Chiapas GCF meeting, the California Air Resources Board (ARB) received a visit at its Sacramento office from a group of environmental justice advocates with ties to the Global South—including an anthropologist who works closely with Amador Hernández, an indigenous leader from Brazil, and representatives of Friends of the Earth U.S. They drew a picture of land grabs, government repression, and related abuses, and urged state officials to drop all consideration of international forest offsets in California climate policy.
Edie Chang, assistant division chief for the ARB, thanked the visitors for raising the issues, and assured them, “We’ve told these governments that we’re far from making a decision.”

Jason Gray, the ARB’s staff counsel, acknowledged the concerns as well: “We really only want to work with jurisdictions that engage in consultation and participatory processes. … We understand the political risks. … We would only want to be involved if California can take a leadership role.”

What that leadership looks like remains to be seen. But if land and culture are threatened by any policy advanced by the GCF, indigenous peasant farmers in Chiapas will not back down without a fight. “These campesinos don’t want a revolution to change they way they live,” explained León Ávila, echoing the words of Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata. “They want a revolution because they want to continue living as they always have.”


Jeff Conant Head ShotJeff Conant wrote this article for What Would Nature Do?, the Spring 2013 issue of YES! Magazine. Jeff is author of A Community Guide to Environmental Health and A Poetics of Resistance: The Revolutionary Public Relations of the Zapatista Insurgency. He writes for Alternet, Earth Island Journal, Upside Down World, and Z Magazine.

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Editor’s Note: This post was originally published by YES! Magazine, and is licensed under Creative Commons. To repost, follow these steps.

Fall 2012 Convergence: When People Become a Snowflake

This fall, Butte College became the first community college to ever host a CSSC convergence. While some may have doubted how many people would haul up to the far north corner of our state, the magnetic power of convergence brought hundreds of students and the young at heart to the Butte College campus. Kevin Killion, Melody Leppard, and Ben Johnson were the main coordinators and did an incredible job of bringing people together - and the entire Butte team truly made magic happen. The theme framed the event: “Uniting the 3 E’s of Sustainability: Ecology, Economy, Equity.” Students from many different backgrounds, interests, skills, and walks of life gathered together to share ideas, campaigns, projects, and inspiration. So many of the attendees were coming to the convergence for the first time. This weekend was one of those rare events that celebrated both diversity and solidarity. That combination to me creates a sustainable, resilient movement – and we are here to stay.

Here is what some convergence attendees had to say about their experience:

“I was a speaker at the event and what an honor it was to converge with so many young, powerful and inspired students. I appreciate the opportunity to share my sustainability project with the group and to receive valuable feedback. It is events like this that show us all, that we really can work together, that people really do care about our planet and our shared future and that we are not alone in this quest to create a sustainable future… Together we are creating a harmonious and sustainable world. Thanks to each person that attended and good job to the team that produced the event” – Peter Melton, The Oneness Sign

“Two things come to mind - first, my partner, Gerard Ungerman and I were lucky enough to present our project, The Respectful Revolution, on Saturday morning… It was really wonderful to be there and to be able to speak to REAL, LIVE, LOVELY people about the work that we are doing. Secondly, it’s pretty tough to beat the experience of lying in the sun, next to sweet strangers, making the snowflake mandala… Many thanks, and congratulations on a fantastic event!!” – Stacey Wear

“This was my first convergence with the coalition, and I must admit it was more than I expected. So much energy from our state’s young and motivated future sustainability leaders! All coming together to heal and educate their fellow concerned students. My favorite parts of the weekend were the keynote speakers and the variety of workshops available. Things I walked away with that resonate the most with me as an individual are the unavailing of our public enemy, and two, the Koch brothers, and how to boycott and protest their efforts to destroy the planet for a buck; and the aguaponics workshop, and how it is the cousin of the strung out hydroponics. This weekend was so inspiring that I now wish to become more involved in my community and the CSSC community, it was such a pleasure to be present at the CSSC fall convergence” – Matthew Kessler

To check out all of the photos from the event, head to mejuba.com, log in with the username [email protected], password “buttecollege.”

And now, for my personal summary of the event:

The Bridges Family of Oroville provided their property as the convergence home-base: students gathered under the northern California stars to meet new friends, sing, dance, and enjoy Butte-home-cooked meals. The entertainment was earth shattering: from Wolf Thump, to the homegrown talent show, to The Dynamics, the energy was absolutely electric.

The keynote speakers of the convergence brought home the idea that all of our crises are interrelated, and that the diversity and resilience we find in our movement reveal that we have the capacity to create the world we wish to see. Chief Caleen Sisk-Franco detailed a very concrete example of how social and environmental justice are interrelated, by shedding light on the very real offenses that corporations and government have made against the Winnemum Wintu tribe and their land, south of Mt. Shasta. A grassroots movement is rooting and sprouting, in the fight to bring salmon back to to their rivers. Following this somber yet hopeful story, Anne Symens-Bucher and Adelaja Simon helped us discover our own motivations and our connections with each other through their presentation of The Work that Reconnects. The pair took us through five principles: 1. “Come from gratidue,” 2. “Don’t be afraid of the dark,” 3. “Link arms,” 4. “Dare to vision,” 5. “Act your age.” They got the audience humming, buzzing, and talking. Building off of that palpable energy, Dwayne Edwards of Butte College used his youthful spirit to get us excited about the very real and applicable connections between all three E’s of sustainability.


Students then dispersed into various workshops throughout the day, on a wide array of topics as diverse as our movement is strong. You can find a list of all workshops offered at the end of this post. After three sessions, our brains were exhausted, so it was time to put our bodies to work. The Butte team ushered all of the attendees to the back field, where we lay down on marked blue lines so that our bodies formed a human fractal snowflake. The living art piece was orchestrated by Daniel Dancer and Art for the Sky. Why a snowflake? Because the shape is the symbol of our organizational model: shared, collective power, with each individual making up a necessary piece of the whole.

Sunday brought just as much action-packed education and organizing as Saturday did. We heard from Kirsten Schwind of Bay Localize, who showed us how her organization is working for true resilience in the Bay Area. Her presentation inspired us all to realize that as a student movement, we already have the people power and resources to make the changes we want to see in our communities – it’s a matter of mobilization. Mapping our visions and dreams can help spark that mobilization. Following up on her message of empowerment, Victor Menotti empowered the crowd with information. He presented on what he and his organization call “the Kochtopus.” The Koch Brothers, two of the most powerful people of the fossil fuel industry, have octopus-like tentacles that reach in many directions, affecting politics and industries in very serious ways. While the image of the Kochtopus terrified and angered us, Menotti emphasized that becoming equipped with an understanding of how our enemies function in the world is the only way to discover where we can intervene and make an impact.

After one final workshop session, we split into breakout groups of UC, CSU, and community college students. Each group strategized on how they would like their educational system to change, and what movements/changes require a system-wide mobilization. The CSSC is based on the principle that there are some changes that just can’t be made on a campus-by-campus basis. There is power in network, there is power in interconnectedness, because it means we can tap into a wide base of energy that wouldn’t be available in fragmented, isolated efforts. Leaving the breakout sessions, we all felt ready to return to our campuses with new ideas and new buzz, while rooted and connected to this new network of friends, sustainabilibuddies, fellow activists.


To me, this convergence was a chorus of bells. Each and every person in attendance had a unique, beautiful, resounding sound to contribute to a greater harmonious chorus, and as all of our energies collided, the spirit grew. If you missed this convergence, you missed out. But fear not, you only have six months to wait for the next one, and plenty of opportunities to connect and make change in the meantime. If you have any questions at all about the event, or would like to get in contact with a workshop presenter or speaker, feel free to send me an email at [email protected] and I’d be happy to put you in touch with whoever can help you out.

List of workshops offered

Caleen Sisk- Battling corporations and further raising of dams
Steve Aquino- Geoengineering the Earth
Andrew Chang- Students Divest! University Endowments Against Dirty Energy
Amber Perkins, Kriss’shan Day, and Ambrosia Krinsky- Environmental Justice: Transition to Regeneration
Gerard Ungerman and Stacey Wear- Respectful Revolution
Kristina Kaufman & Claire Hunt- In Our Own Voice: Talking About Mental illness
Dwayne Edwards- Environmental Economics: How do we use it?
Daniel Dancer - ART FIRST! Shifting Paradigms through Art Activism
Chauncey Quam- Taking Charge of your Fertility
Justin Valis- Can you be Sustainable without being Vegan?
Chara Bui- Putting the Social Justice in Environmental Sustainability
Zen Trenholm- Cooperatives and Democratizing the Food System
Alex Vincent- Permaculture: A Tool for Uniting Disciplines Towards Change
Shana Rappaport- Education for Action: Models of Experiential Education from Bioneers and Beyond
Lauren Jabusch- The Intersection of Engineering and Sustainability
Parker Townley- Organizing for Fair Trade on Campus
Brian Croshal- Aquaponics: A Unique Food Solution
Mica Stumpf, Melody Benavidez - Nonviolent Direct Action: building a movement through safe and ethical demonstrations
Butte Environmental Council & Friends- Water is Life
Andi Goss, Chris Tominello, Tommy Diestel- Pulp and back again… A paper’s tale
Meredith Jacobson and Ariel Cherbowsky- Beyond Nature Writing: Ecology of Place and Writing for Change
Peter Melton- The Oneness Sign - We are all in this together
Rachel Taber, Tiffany Fink-Haynes- Common Threads: Act Local, Win Global
Victor Menotti / International Forum on Globalization- Sandy was Strengthened by Billionaires Blocking Carbon Controls
Kirsten Schwind- Map Your Future: Linking Youth With Jobs Building Community Resilience
Annie Montes- Biofiltration: Being green by planting greens
Chloe Rice- Intro to Organizing; Real Food Wheel
Amber Perkins and Ambrosia Krinsky- Anti-oppression, White Privilege, and Ally Training
Sasha Walters- Sustainability At Home

Convergence Logistics


Greetings!

We hope you are all excited for the CSSC’s fall convergence held from November 9th-11th at Butte Community College, 3536 Butte Campus Dr., Oroville, CA 95965. We have prepared an incredible weekend complete with inspirational keynote speakers Chief Caleen Sisk-Franco, Anne Symens-Bucher, Adelaja Simon, Victor Menotti, Kirsten Schwind, and a variety of student-led workshops on diverse topics highlighting the interconnectedness of the three pillars of sustainability, some large-scale interactive workshops, local entertainment, and a super delicious menu of local vegetarian meals. The theme of this fall convergence will be to focus on the interconnectedness of the three pillars of sustainability: Economic, Social, and Environmental Justice. Get excited to learn, get inspired, have fun, and meet some new sustainabilibuddies!

Program of Events

Click here to see the fun that is in store for us all!

Talent Show Saturday

    We will be hosting our Talent Show extravaganza Saturday night! You are encouraged to bring whatever props or costume you need to perform. Please bring your special talent that you have been working on in the mirror for the last 5 years. You know the one we’re talking about.

    Bring your costume - there will be a prize for best costume. We can provide amplification, microphones, and hook ups to play Mp3 devices. Be sure to bring whatever you need to perform your special talent!

Meals

We will provide good local food throughout the event!

We encourage you to eat before arrival, and to bring your own personal snacks for the weekend, as well as utensils for eating. We will not be providing dishes or utensils, yet will have cleaning stations for you to wash your supplies.

Light snacks Friday
Breakfast, lunch and dinner on Saturday
Breakfast on Sunday

Supplies List

  • Tent
  • Sleeping bag or warm blanket
  • Sleeping Pad/Yoga mat
  • Flashlight or Headlamp
  • Folding Chair
  • Warm Clothing/Change of clothes
  • Toiletries (Toothpaste, toothbrush, whatever you need to feel fresh)
  • Reusable Water Bottle
  • Rain Jacket or Umbrella
  • Mess Kit (plate, bowl, coffee mug/cup, cloth napkin, utensils)
  • Notebook and writing utensil for note taking, sketching, journaling, etc.
  • Personal medication

Housing at the Convergence- What to Expect Upon Arrival!

    The Bridges family has generously donated their property and are allowing the CSSC Convergence to use this land as our camping and dining location! The private property is located at 295 Shippee Rd, Oroville, CA 95965 - 5 miles from Butte Campus. Upon arrival we will have you sign a Waiver of Liability, from there you will be free to set up your camping accommodations and begin meeting all the wonderful folks. There will be light snacks available Friday evening, and we encourage you to eat before arriving, and to also bring some extra food for you and your friends to snack on throughout the weekend. Please see the list of supplies to bring, to ensure the most comfortable camping experience possible. Because the ground of the campsite is hardpan, please bring rocks to hold on your tent down, as you will not be able to use stakes. Also, bring a tarp, as there may be rain.

Parking: We will ask that everyone park between the cones in the designated area. If it is raining, we ask that you park on the road.

Toilets/Washing Area: There will be porta-potties on site. There are no showers or sinks. We will have a water and wash area set up for brushing teeth, washing hands and faces. There is also running water for drinking.

First Aid: We will have a first aid kit on site under the large tent with basic supplies. If you have a medical condition that may require specific care, please let us know ahead of time.

Emergency Contact

If you or someone else needs emergency help, please contact the following people on site.

  • Mimi Riley (530) 520-5251
  • Kelly Munson (207) 650-2498
  • Kevin Killion (530) 966-0480
  • Melody Leppard (530) 520-5367
  • Ben Johnson (530) 520-8816
  • Please email [email protected] if you have any questions.

    Thank you, we can’t wait to see your lovely smiling faces!

Fall 2012 Convergence: The Three Pillars of Sustainability

The Fall 2012 Convergence is just around the corner! This weekend we will be making CSSC history: this is the first time a convergence has ever been hosted at a community college. The team at Butte has cooked up an incredible, jam-packed, inspiring weekend for you all, so if you haven’t registered yet - get on it! A message from our Convergence Coordinators, with lots of important details:

Greetings!

We hope you are all excited for the CSSC’s fall convergence held from November 9th-11th at Butte Community College. We have prepared an incredible weekend complete with inspirational keynote speakers Chief Caleen Sisk-Franco, Anne Symens-Bucher, Adelaja Simon, Victor Menotti, Kirsten Schwind, and a variety of student-led workshops, some large-scale interactive workshops, local entertainment, and a super delicious menu of local vegetarian meals. The theme of this fall convergence will be to focus on the interconnectedness of the three pillars of sustainability: Economic, Social, and Environmental Justice. Get excited to learn, get inspired, have fun, and meet some new sustainabilibuddies!

Still haven’t registered? Click here to register to attend!

Registration is open to all students regardless of involvement with CSSC.

Please note that while registration closes on November 7th online (25$), on site registration is available throughout the convergence (30$). We encourage everyone to register online ahead of time when possible. Also, registration is free for all Butte students!

The convergence provides a chance to network with and bond with allies from across California, working in diverse areas of sustainability. This convergence is provided at the low cost of $25 per student! This includes two nights of camping, and a full day of student led workshops on diverse topics highlighting interconnectedness of ecolgy, equity, and economy.

Keynote Speakers!

Caleen Sisk-Franco

We are honored to present our keynote speaker Caleen Sisk-Franco, Chief and Spiritual Leader of the Winnemem Wintu (Indigenous People of the McCloud River south of Mt. Shasta, California). Caleen is an internationally known speaker on traditional tribal and spiritual issues, having spoken on diverse topics such as spiritual medicine ways, the spirit of water, global climate change, sacred sites protection, and the responsibility of tribal people to honor their tribal life way. Click here to learn more: http://www.winnememwintu.us/caleen-sisk/

Anne Symens-Bucher, Adelaja Simon

There will be an all day workshop hosted during Friday prior to check-in at Butte College’s Chico campus for those of you who arrive early! Anne has traveled extensively with Joanna Macy, participated in dozens of Macy’s workshops and is herself a facilitator of the Work That Reconnects. Adelaja stopped cooperating with business school to become a permaculturist. Annie and Adelaja will be hosting a Workshop from 9am to 5pm on Nov 9th at the Butte College Chico Center. [2320 Forest avenue, Chico, Ca room 146] Register by emailing [email protected] or call 1 530 895 2428.

Daniel Dancer: Art For the Sky

Art for the sky will create 70+ foot tall picture of a fractal snowflake made out of 300 student leaders (you) on Saturday. These enchanting creations are a whole-body way of stimulating our imagination to see the elusive “big picture” and help us understand our interconnection with one another and all life. With hundreds of people at a time collaborating in the creation of something beautiful, each living painting is a blessing and a promise to better care for our world and one another. Click here to learn more about the artist: Daniel Dancer: Art For the Sky

Kirsten Schwind

Kirsten Schwind, is Co-founder and Program Director of Bay Localize, a nonprofit building an equitable and resilience Bay Area. Kirsten is deeply involved in local energy policy and co-founded the Local Clean Energy Alliance, the Bay Area’s largest clean energy advocacy alliance. Kirsten also worked for several years in Latin America in human rights and the environment, and is fluent in Spanish.

Dwayne Edwards

Meet our Cultural Affairs Director here at Butte College! All too often though, people think straight to environmentalism without knowing the immense implications society and the economy have on creating a sustainable world. Dwayne lives to resolve that myth.

Victor Menotti

Author Victor has written and spoken extensively about the impact of globalization on ecosystems, and he has helped build internatial networks among the traditional farming, forest, fishing, and indigenous communities whose survival depends on them.

Program of Events

To see the fun that is in store for y’all click here.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1v3r1-6mZ7W0fwKMzI7dR-NtxT1pJd_n8RK4Xerde0Iw/edit

Talent Show Saturday

We will be hosting our Talent Show extravaganza Saturday night.

You are encouraged to bring whatever props or costume you need to perform. Please bring your special talent that you have been working on in the mirror for the last 5 years. You know the one we are talking about.

Bring your Costume, prize for best costume. We can provide Amplification, Microphones, and hook ups to play Mp3 Devices. Be sure to bring whatever you need to perform your special talent!

 

Drinking/Drugs: This is an alcohol and drug free Convergence. Use of alcohol or drugs may result in you being asked to leave the campground immediately.

Meals!

We will provide good local food throughout the event! We encourage you to eat before arrival, and to bring your own personal snacks for the weekend.

Light snacks Friday

Breakfast, lunch and dinner on Saturday

Breakfast on Sunday

*Please bring your own Mess Kit (plate, bowl, cup, cloth napkin, utensils) as these will not be provided!

Food Donation

Convergences are well known for their outstanding meals, we will be providing 4 freshly prepared vegan meals throughout the convergence. In order to feed everyone we are going to need a lot of donation. That means that everyone attending needs to try and bring a food item. To find out what supplies we need, how much, and how you can help please click this link to our Food Donation Document.

Important Information & Supplies List

· Tent

· Sleeping bag or warm blanket

· Sleeping Pad/Yoga mat

· Flashlight or Headlamp

· Folding Chair

· Warm Clothing/Change of clothes

· Toiletries (Toothpaste, toothbrush, whatever you need to feel fresh)

· Water Bottle

· Rain Jacket or Umbrella

· Mess Kit (plate, bowl, cup, cloth napkin, utensils)

· Notebook and writing utensil for note taking, sketching, journaling, etc.

Housing at the Convergence

The Bridges family has generously donated their property and are allowing the CSSC Convergence to use this land as our camping and dining location! The private property is located at 255 Shippee Rd Oroville, CA 95965, 5 miles from Butte Campus. Upon arrival we will have you sign a Waiver of Liability, from there you will be free to set up your camping accommodations and begin meeting all the wonderful folks. There will be light snacks available Friday evening, and we encourage you to eat before arriving, and to also bring some extra food for you and your friends to snack on throughout the weekend. Please see the list of supplies to bring, to ensure the most comfortable camping experience possible.

Parking: We will ask that everyone park between the cones in the designated area. If it is raining, we ask that you park on the road.

Toilets/Washing Area

There will be porta-potties on site. There are no showers or sinks. We will have a water and wash area set up for brushing teeth, washing hands and faces. There is also running water for drinking.

First Aid

We will have a first aid kit on site under the large tent with basic supplies. If you have a medical condition that may require specific care, please let us know ahead of time. To donate Supplies, which are needed, please follow the food donations link below.

Food Donation Document

Emergency Contact

If you or someone else needs emergency help, please contact the following people on site.

Mimi Riley (530) 520-5251

Kelly Munson (207) 650-2498

Kevin Killion (530) 966-0480

Melody Leppard (530) 520 5367

Ben Johnson (530) 520 8816

Please email [email protected] if you have any questions.

Thank you, we can’t wait to see your lovely smiling faces!

-The Butte College CSSC Team

 

Election Day TUESDAY: Do you have a vote plan?

Re-posted from WeArePowerShift.org

This blog was co-authored by Anastasia Schemkes, Campaign Rep & Sasha Shyduroff, Organizing Manager of the Sierra Student Coalition.

One of the biggest regrets I have is not voting in my first presidential election, the 2008 election.

At the time it was one more thing to think about while planning to live abroad. As the election drew near, I could feel the buzz of it in France and within the community of American students I studied with. On election night, every American student I knew in my town stayed up all night as the results came in, myself included. But I didn’t know that every time after that the ’08 election is mentioned, that sinking feeling in my gut would reappear as my friends recount their experiences.

I wish one of my peers had told me “your vote is important, here’s how to make sure your vote counts.”

This year is different. I have spent every day of the last few months talking with every young person I know and meet about their right to vote and how to utilize it.

Tonight, just like waiting to open presents on Christmas morning, I am eagerly awaiting going to my polling location tomorrow. Tomorrow will be my first time voting in a presidential election. After, I will wear my “I Voted” sticker proudly and then I will go to the phones, again. And I will talk to my friends, again. And I will go on facebook, again.

Your vote is important. Now get out there and vote!

Here are some tips to make the most out of Election Day:

1. People are excited to vote this year so head to the polls early! Seriously, go when they first open especially if you’re on a college campus, how many of your friends will be up at 7am? More importantly, have your vote plan ready- When are you going? Where is your polling location? How are you getting there? Are there others you can bring with you?

2. Don’t know your polling location? TEXT “Polling” to 69866 and you’ll get an auto-reply asking you to enter your address. For Spanish speakers use: “Donde” to 87787.

3. Voter disenfranchisement and voter intimidation is REAL and serious!! If you or anyone thinks they are being wrongly turned away from the poll or being asked to vote a provisional ballot at their polling location you need to call a lawyer, or something just seems wrong call:

1 866-OUR-VOTE this connects you to the hotline with Election Protection.

Election Protection site: http://www.866ourvote.org/

3. Another good resource: http://fairelectionsnetwork.com/

http://fairelectionsnetwork.com/resources/student-voting this site has state specific voting guides on what people need to vote).

Now it’s your turn: share what you will be doing tomorrow to turn out and protect the vote!

 

Apply for a Scholarship at the Convergence!

A goal of our CSSC Convergences is to provide everyone with the opportunity to attend the Convergence regardless of their economic status; therefore we have created this fee waiver form that will allow you to register for free. Filling out this form will be extremely valuable in documenting the success stories of each individual as well as documenting the role the CSSC plays in the advancement of your success.

Our deepest apologies that this is up so late. Because of this, scholarship applications will be reviewed on a day-by-day basis and recipients will be advised of their fee waiver after the review process. Please e-mail any questions or concerns to [email protected] and apply away!

Apply for a scholarship!

Project We Own It

 

The Isla Vista Food Co-op is a natural and organic foods consumer cooperative located in Santa Barbara. The co-op is the product of student empowerment and activism that began in 1970, and remains dedicated to cooperative principles of collective ownership and sustainability (all three E’s - economy, ecology, equity). The mission of the Isla Vista Food Co-op is “to provide the the residents of Isla Vista and neighboring communities of Santa Barbara with reasonably priced foods, products and services that promote a healthier lifestyle and environment,” with a vision of “a community engaged in cooperative principles and values of social, economic, and environmental values” (the Isla Vista Food Coop Website). Sound familiar? The CSSC and the Isla Vista Food Co-op share very similar values.

Over the years, the Isla Vista Food Co-op has been very supportive of the CSSC - and now they need our help. The co-op is at risk of losing the space that has been its home for the past 32 years. The owner of the space recently notified Isla Vista Food Co-op that they must purchase the space when their lease ends, or it will be put on the market for sale.

And thus, the Isla Vista Food Co-op launched Project We Own It,” a campaign to raise the necessary funds by mobilizing the communities that support the co-op. Already, the project has raised over $100,000 through the power of community support. Now, they have less than forty days to raise the remaining $90,000 in order to purchase their property and achieve the kind of stability that will allow the co-op to flourish long into the future.

This is no small challenge, but with the help of the thousands of people who care about the cooperative, sustainable food movement, there’s no doubt that it can be done.

That’s why we at the CSSC are asking YOU to make a small (well, any size, really) pledge to Project We Own It. All you have to do is CLICK HERE and you can be part of the change.

This is not about donating to some organization just because you think it’s the right thing to do. This is about seizing the opportunity to take a stake in your future. Supporting the Isla Vista Food Co-op means supporting the cooperative food system, helping it grow and succeed, which ultimately means we all succeed - because cooperatives are really about us. So please, make a pledge, whatever you can contribute, to claim ownership of a brighter future in California.

From the Isla Vista Food Co-op

 

 

GMOs: Too Big to Fail

By Hanna Morris, UC Berkeley student

Originally posted at http://calibermag.org/ , a student-run publication at UC Berkeley

We all fail. Our attempts, for example, at crafting an esteemed piece of literature or painting a revered portrait or impressing our friends with a delicious gourmet meal often end in disastrous disarray. But, most of us accept and learn from our failures. If the apple pie burns, we try making cake next time instead. In short, we recognize when our experiments fall through and refocus our energy and approach. The fervent researchers and businessmen dedicated to the lofty idea of solving the world’s food security problem through Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), however, are refusing to accept their colossal failure and are, in effect, dragging the rest of the world down with them.

Billions of dollars have been spent on, entire careers have been dedicated to and hundreds of farmers have been convinced of this idea that biotechnology will solve all potential agricultural quandaries. This enormous investment of resources has made it difficult to accept the resulting failure.

The idea behind GMOs is honorable: use genetic engineering and biotechnology to guarantee a sustainable, and affordable food supply. The results, however, have been less than ideal.

Monsanto, the virtual monopoly over commercial biotechnology, calls itself a “Sustainable Agriculture Company”. In defining “Sustainable Agriculture”, the company adopts the non-profit, Field to Market’s, definition: “agricultural sustainability meet[s] the needs of the present while…decreasing environmental impact and improving human health through access to safe, nutritious food improving social and economic well-being of rural communities.”

Although a mouthful, this definition is an encouraging one. The issue is, Monsanto’s products contradict all aspects of this definition. GMOs have degraded natural ecosystems as well as threatened humans’ physical and psychological health.

There are two main types of crop-based GMOs currently dominating the market. The first type makes plants (such as soybeans) resistant to harm from powerful weed-killers, while the other type makes plants (such as corn) directly resistant to pests. Both types pose substantial environmental and health consequences.

The first type (plants modified to be resistant to herbicides) is engineered to be impervious to the chemical, glyphosate.

According to renowned agricultural consultant and physician, Dr. Arden Andersen, this chemical was originally patented “in the early 1960s as a descaling agent [used to remove mineral residues inside dishwashers, vents and the like]. It was only by serendipity that it got spilled, or something, and it killed the weeds it contacted. It was subsequently purchased by Monsanto, and the rest is history…its effect and use as an herbicide have been afterthoughts.”

Monsanto jumped on the opportunity to turn this powerful chemical into an effective herbicide. The problem is, glyphosate is a chelating agent that harms plants by removing vital minerals.

According to Dr. Robert Kremer’s 15-year study, “Glyphosate is a chelator, which will bind with elements such as manganese and calcium, and those sorts of nutrients, and immobilize them. In other words, it will make them unavailable for plant uptake.”

The result is a removal of microorganisms and nutrients beneficial for the plant (note: perhaps Stanford University should research the nutritional value of GMOs as opposed to their recent study on the nutritional value of organic foods). This, in effect, fosters pathogen growth in both the plants and humans who consume them.

Numerous veterinarians have already reported health consequences from animals fed GMOs sprayed with glyphosate. A yet-to-be-named organism has been found in these animals leading to reproductive failure.

Longstanding microbiology and plant pathology expert Dr. Huber states, “the evidence is that [glyphosate and GMOs]change the environment to make the plant more conducive for that organism to proliferate, and to thus be available and in the grain and feed that the animals receive.”

The introduction of an artificial organism disrupts and alters the natural environment, allowing for the production of pathogens previously unable to proliferate. It is an impossible task to anticipate how the millions and millions of microbes (some of which are undocumented and unknown to scientists) will react when a foreign and artificially engineered plant is introduced. Is it worth the risk when viable and safe alternatives such as permaculture and ecological-agriculture methods exist?

The second type of crop-based GMO (plants engineered to kill pests directly) has had similarly unexpected problems. These GMOs, also known as Bt, cannot outmaneuver the powers of natural selection. Strains of pests become resistant to the toxins produced by Bt. This phenomenon will always occur. No scientist can possibly overcome the powerful force of evolution, no matter how much money is pumped into his or her research.

These results were unexpected because no extensive or legitimate precautionary testing occurred prior to the widespread use of GMOs. In fact, documented research fraud has been reported ever since the onset of Monsanto’s commercial rampage. And yet, the US government has allowed the production and sale of GMOs to not only American farmers, but to international farmers as well.

This lack of responsibility has lead to international tragedy.

The largest wave of recorded suicides in human history has occurred since 2002, when Monsanto’s Bt cotton was first introduced to India’s countryside. 17,638 farmers committed suicide in 2009 alone (that’s about one death every 30 minutes). Many of these farmers killed themselves by consuming the very thing that caused their depression- Monsanto’s insecticide fluids.

Why is this “GM (Genetically Modified) Genocide” occurring? Poor, Indian farmers initially given “free” Monsanto seed trials cannot afford the continual expense of pricey pesticides and seeds. The poor farmers cannot go back to their original farming methods because of the proliferation of resistant “superbugs”. The farmers have become dependent on the latest pesticide and the latest enhanced seed.

While most dramatically seen in India, similar tragedy has occurred throughout Monsanto’s international domain. The result has been several lawsuits and the ban of GMOs in numerous countries including France, Peru, Hungary, and Poland. India is now seeking to legally ban the sale of Monsanto GMO products within their country.

While Monsanto didn’t intend to produce dangerous pathogens, breed pesticide resistant “superbugs”, and destroy the livelihoods of thousands of poor international farmers to the point of suicide, their unbending dedication to the failed experiment of GMOs is inexcusable. GMO companies are fixing research results, pumping money into governmental lobbying campaigns, and threatening anyone who takes a stand against them.

According to information released by WikiLeaks, the United States government has established plans to “penalize” nations barring Monsanto’s products through “military-style trade wars”. The United States is planning to, in effect, destroy policies aimed at protecting nations from destructive GMOs.

Proposition 37: California Right to Know Genetically Engineered Food Act (calling for mandatory labeling of all GMO foods), faces similar opposition. Monsanto spent over $4 million on the campaign against Proposition 37, funding ads and encouraging academic researchers to speak out against the Proposition.

An Agriculture and Resource Economics professor right here at U.C. Berkeley, David Zilberman, for example, states that “labeling GMOs has the potential to marginalize it and reduce the investment in research, development and introduction of new products and slow the advancement of the frontier of knowledge.”

This logic is problematic. If Zilberman is truly concerned with “the advancement of the frontier of knowledge”, then he should be in support of labeling. Since government research is inadequate, how are independent, third-party researchers supposed to measure the effects of GMOs if they don’t know which foods are, in fact, GMOs? If genetically engineered foods remain unlabeled, we will not be able to research their full health consequences.

Billions of dollars, academic careers, and political agendas have been fully invested into GMOs. These actors are using their undeniable clout to sustain their failed dream of a world-changing technology. Too many resources have been dumped into this massive project to allow the government, Monsanto, and their academic employees to accept failure. The passage of Proposition 37 can take away some of their power.

CSU Chico

STUDENT GROUP: AS Sustainability
COUNCIL REP: Aurelia
CURRENT PROJECTS:

  • Compost Display Area & Garden
  • This Way to Sustainability Conference
  • Organic Vegetable Project
  • CFL Take-it-Back

WEBSITE: AS Sustainability

CONTACT: [email protected]

CSU San Francisco

STUDENT GROUP: ECO Students
CURRENT PROJECTS:

  • Compost Bins
  • Farm to Fork

WEBSITE: ECO Students

CONTACT: [email protected]

CSU San Jose

STUDENT GROUP: SJSU Environmental Club
COUNCIL REPS: Chara Bui
CURRENT PROJECTS:

  • On-Campus Recycling
  • Veggielution Urban Farm

WEBSITE: SJSU Environmental Club

CONTACT: [email protected]

CSU Los Angeles

STUDENT GROUP: Students United for Sustainability (SUS)
COUNCIL REPS: Carlos Naranjo
CURRENT PROJECTS:

  • The Green Initiative Fund (TGIF)

WEBSITE: CSULA SUStainability Page

CONTACT: [email protected]

Cassie Belden, Happiness Coordinator

As Happiness Coordinator, I have the joy and privilege of checking in with my fellow op team members and making sure they are doing well. I also get to send them birthday notes and do other random fun things. Yay happiness!

SCHOOL: UC Santa Barbara, 2013
MAJOR: Psychology and Environmental Studies
PAST ROLES: Convergence Attendee
HOMETOWN: Cobb Mountain, California

About Me

I’m 22 years old, love the outdoors, love food, love people, and love learning. I believe that the best things in life are simple, like homemade hot chocolate and snuggling. Soccer is the best sport ever (to play). I just learned how to do a cartwheel this summer, and I’m really stoked about it. I like books, a lot. Also long-winded conversations, about pretty much anything. Road trips/bike trips/adventures of all sorts are really neat. Lastly, it is my utmost belief that we will all arrive at success (aka happiness) if we let our life paths be directed by what makes us passionate and excited. Follow your heart <3

How I Got Involved In CSSC

After the first convergence, I knew what an amazing coalition the CSSC is. I continued to attend convergences and was invited to a Student Leadership Retreat in summer 2012. There, I was encouraged to get involved, and I was happy to do so!

The Area of Sustainability That Interests Me Most

Building sustainable communities

The Role of Student Action in Sustainability

Student action is the branch of this movement with people power. We are enthusiastic and powerful individuals, who come together and create positive change on our local levels and national ones. We inspire our peers and sometimes even our parents. Furthermore, we recognize the responsibility we have to future generations, and work together collectively for our rights and theirs.

Sustainability Projects I’ve Worked On

  • Convergence @ UC Santa Barbara
  • Keystone XL workshop
  • Environmental Justice Chair @ UCSB
    • booking speakers like Majora Carter & Van Jones

Invitation: The Future of Higher Education Endowments

Invitation 

November 9, 2012

Harvard Kennedy School, Cambridge, MA

 

The Future of Higher Education Endowments

Conversations about Responsible Investing and Sustainability

Universities collectively hold more than $400 billion in their endowments. While there are similarities between the 800-plus institutions, each school has its own unique set of circumstances. Some schools manage their investments in-house, some use outside managers, and many use consultants to provide advice on a wide variety of investment policies and practices. Investment choices can also be influenced by a school’s mission. Money can be invested in a variety of asset classes, such as real estate, private equity vehicles and community institutions, in addition to stocks or bonds issued by publicly traded companies.

Endowments provide a substantial portion of many schools’ budgets and wise management of these funds is essential for ensuring the future of colleges and universities. Increasingly, students, alumni, and communities are asking that endowment managers practice responsible investment and take more robust action to ensure their investments encourage environmental and social sustainability. Considering these factors also can mitigate investment risks that often are not taken into account in traditional investment management, which why a growing number of large institutional investors are taking action, dramatically changing options in the investment world.

Join the Initiative for Responsible Investment, a project of the Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations at Harvard University, and the Responsible Endowments Coalition, for this one-day gathering where we will explore different options for the investing of endowments, and related transparency and accountability issues relevant for campus communities. This space will bring together a small group of highly knowledgeable students, administrators, faculty, and trustees, to discuss, in an open and intellectual way, their thoughts and desires for how endowments can change while continuing to meet their fiduciary duty and performance expectations, limit risk, and incorporate the values of the college into the investment process.

 

More information to follow.

To register contact Katie Grace at the Initiative for Responsible Investment at [email protected]. Directions upon registration.

The cost for this event is $50, which is intended to cover the cost of breakfast and lunch.

The following link provides useful information on hotels and transit in the area:

http://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/contact

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Upcoming Opportunities

Check out these three fabulous opportunities to enhance your leadership in the sustainability movement:

 

1. Greenpeace Action Camp, 10/4-10/7 - Apply ASAP!

Are you ready to escalate your campus campaigns? Want to learn how to create, plan, and use effective non-violent direct action tactics? Join Greenpeace October 4-7 just north of Los Angeles for an intensive, weekend training program that includes an introduction to Greenpeace, non-violent direct action, legal briefing, action simulation, and much more! According to Zen Trenholm, UC Berkeley student and CSSC Board Member, “This is a phenomenal training…Be prepared to learn, reflect and challenge your assumptions.”

Sign up today! http://members.greenpeace.org/survey/start/502/

 

2. Sierra Student Coalition, Beyond Oil Campaign

Are you ready for a world of clean air, green energy, and good jobs? Sick of seeing the influence of Big Oil everywhere you turn? Launch a Campuses Beyond Oil campaign at your school this fall!

We cannot win on climate unless we win on oil. Colleges and universities are the place to catalyze this change. Our nation’s schools burn through oil in their campus fleets and through student, faculty, and staff travel.

As part of the Campuses Beyond Oil campaign, you will play a crucial role in reducing this dangerous oil use. You can create some of our nation’s first oil free communities - by working with your administration to trade dirty, polluting cars for fleets of cleaner, more efficient vehicles and by partnering with fellow students and community members to reduce oil use in the way students, faculty, and staff get around campus and into the community. You will be supported in this work by a unique set of resources developed by the Sierra Student Coalition and the Sierra Club’s Beyond Oil Campaign just for this campaign! In addition to a campaign toolkit and recruitment materials, you will have direct support from staff and student experts on this campaign.

Launching a Campuses Beyond Oil Campaign is a unique opportunity that will create tangible solutions that other schools, organizations, and businesses will follow to reduce their own oil use. And schools across California are the prime place to launch this transformation. With your help,we will be the first generation to move beyond oil.

Are you interested in learning more? Sign up now to be one of the first to launch a Campuses Beyond Oil Campaign this fall!

-The Campuses Beyond Oil Team

 

3. Organize with Grassroots Global Justice Alliance!

Grassroots Global Justice Alliance (GGJ) provides an exciting opportunity for a self-motivated, creative and experienced organizer. The Organizer works under the supervision of GGJ’s National Coordinator. The position requires willingness to work long hours (more than 40+ per week) a flexible schedule including some nights and weekends, frequent travel within the USA and some international travel. This is a full time position.

Grassroots Global Justice is a national alliance of grassroots organizations building a popular movement for peace, democracy and a sustainable world. Alliance members support each other’s local struggles and collaborate with international allies committed to building a transformative social justice movement beyond borders. GGJ provides opportunities for grassroots leaders to dialogue, think strategically and sharpen our understanding of global political and economic forces that cause poverty, conflict and environmental destruction in our communities. After organizing an extensive participatory process with our members, in September of 2011 GGJ affirmed a new initiative at our membership congress: “No War, No Warming, Build an Economy for People and the Planet!” We are prioritizing climate justice, anti-war and militarism, and developing alternative visions for the economy as our core areas of work. For more about Grassroots Global Justice Alliance (GGJ), visit our website here: www.ggjalliance.org.

http://ggjalliance.org/GGJorganizer2012

Announcing the Fall 2012 Convergence

The CSSC Fall Convergence will be held November 9th to 11th at Butte Community College.

Join hundreds of students from across CA to build community, share resources, plan action, attend workshops, and celebrate.

This year’s theme will be Uniting the Three E’s of Sustainability, in an attempt to reaffirm our understanding that sustainability is equally in parts comprised of Social Justice, Economic Equality, as well as Environmental Stewardship.

Students from UC’s, CSUs, Community Colleges, Private Universities and high schools are highly encouraged to attend! Convergences are open events and we encourage everyone with an interest in sustainability to attend, be they students, organizers or non-affiliated community members. Attendees will find opportunities to hear inspiring speakers, exchange ideas in workshops, and to celebrate our collective successes.

Mission

Check out the Mission of this fall’s convergence here!

Lead a Workshop

Workshop proposals are now being accepted! Please submit a workshop proposal.

Registration

Registration at the convergence includes 4 delicious vegan & gluten-free organic meals, housing for the entire weekend, and access to all workshops, keynote speakers & events at the CSSC Fall 2012 Convergence!

    • Early bird registration is now open and costs $20.
  • Regular online registration costs $25 until November 7, 2012
  • On-site registration costs $30

Register today!

 

 

More details will be released as they are available. For now, spread the word, register, apply to lead a workshop, and get excited!

Why should YOU attend a convergence? Get a feel for the energy by checking out the video footage from last spring’s convergence at Cal Poly SLO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuLSXzbqD-k

Photo by Tia Tyler

 

The Three E’s of Sustainability

“The California Student Sustainability Coalition is a non-profit organization that supports and connects students from across California to help them transform their educational institutions into models of sustainability” – the CSSC website.

But what does “sustainability” mean? Lately, it’s become a media buzzword, yet another drop in the greenwash bucket. As students, we have the power to redefine how our society thinks about sustainability. The CSSC is committed to recognizing and working toward the “Three E’s” of sustainability: economy, ecology, and equity. Unlike conventional notions of sustainability that are linked to environmentalism and dwell only in the ecology sector, this three-pronged approach takes into account the fact that all three “e’s” are interconnected.

There is no ecological sustainability without equity. There is no economic sustainability without sound ecology. In fact, the words “economy” and “ecology” come from the same root - “oikos” or “ecos,” the Greek word for “household.” We all inhabit the same household that we call earth.

What does that mean on the ground? CSSC chapters across the state work on issues that relate to all three sustainability sectors. CSSC students are working toward a more just society for all – equitably, ecologically, and economically. I asked our Council Reps to write back with examples of how their chapters are addressing the 3 E’s. Here are some responses:

Equity and Ecology: “Last year, my campus (Claremont McKenna College) tried to include equity into its environmental goals. At our parties, there was not only the issue that students weren’t recycling their disposable red cups, but they were also not even picking up after themselves. They would leave all the work to the grounds/maintenance staff, which definitely wasn’t fair to them. It also cost the school extra money to clean up. So, as a work in progress, we have painted trash cans red to look like an actual red party cup, in an attempt to encourage students to pick up after themselves and recycle. We also hooked this into a general recycling initiative on campus. This effort is ongoing, but an important issue on campus that we continue to address.” - Hannah Haskell, Claremont McKenna College Council Rep

Ecology: “The [Glendale Community College] Environmental Club went to Bakersfield, California to help “Wind Wolves Preserve” restore the native salt bush habitat by planting seeds and building a fence to protect them from cattle.” - Monica Tecson, GCC Council Rep

Equity, Ecology, and Economy: A campaign by Cal Poly Fair Trade Club is aimed at contracting CAN Coffee on campus, and CAN Coffee is a fair-trade coffee (economy and equity). The coffee is grown using the concept of agroecology, which is the understanding that the production of coffee has to be developed within an agricultural system, without disturbing the system (ecology). - Eb McKibben, Cal Poly SLO Council Rep

Economy and ecology: “At [UC Santa Barbara], the Environmental Affairs Board tackles a bunch of different projects. One that has proved to be successful is the “Carrot Mob.” It follows the proverb that says it is easier getting a horse to water by leading it with a carrot rather than thumping it with a stick. We went to various businesses to “green” them by getting them to have more efficient lighting or other appliances, etc. We told them that we would hold a “carrot mob” there, which would attract a lot of customers. By going to the business that day, customers knew they were supporting a good cause. So the store was willing to do it because it increased their customer base for the day. This was all with the agreement that they would match dollar for dollar what they earned that day and invest it in more efficient energies. This would definitely be the economy side!” - Emily Wililams, UCSB Council Rep

Fighting for sustainability means addressing income inequality and poverty. It means preserving forests but also preserving the communities that live off the forest. It means ending all types of discrimination. It means ending corporate personhood. It means addressing climate change but not at the expense of people who are already exploited and impoverished. It means clean energy but also equitable energy, real food but also equitable access to food. It means getting young people out to vote. It means empowering students to be agents of justice of all kinds on their campuses and beyond.

Martin Luther King famously stated, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny.”

The theme of this fall’s Convergence at Butte College is “Uniting the 3 E’s of Sustainability,” which we will be exploring through workshops, speakers, and other activities. Check out the mission statement and info page for the convergence, and hopefully we’ll see you there!

Have an idea of how the CSSC can better represent all three “E’s”? Post a comment here, or email me at [email protected].

Reflections on the 2012 Summer Leadership Retreat

Twice a year, the CSSC hosts leadership retreats for students who are interested in getting involved or staying involved in the leadership of the organization. The CSSC operates with a three-pronged structure: a Council of students from across the state, an Operating Team, and a Board of Representatives. At retreats, these bodies get together to discuss the direction and structure of the CSSC, plan and strategize for campaigns and projects, come up with new ideas, elect new leadership, and have fun with one another!

Photo by Tia Tyler

The 2012 Summer Leadership Retreat took place at the McLaughlin Natural Reserve in Lower Lake, CA, from August 9th-13th. 28 student leaders were able to attend, and the retreat was one of the best ones yet. Here are what some of the attendees had to say:

The Summer Leadership Retreat energized and equipped me as a leader by giving me strategic training, new friends, and a sense of community as we work toward a common purpose. I highly recommend this experience and this organization for anybody who wishes to create positive change in the world.
- Chara Bui, Council Rep, San Jose State University

This summer leadership retreat brought me around full circle to my first leadership retreat I attended in 2010. It was an amazing reminder of the diversity of experience and passion for this work held by CSSC students. I am so excited to have had the chance to connect with leaders old and new and am really looking forward to working with our new student leaders this coming school year.
- Andrew Chang, CSSC Campaign Director, UC Santa Barbara Class of 2011

CSSC is a beautiful framily. This year’s summer leadership retreat was full of daily conversations about making real positive change in the world. Everyone is so honest and welcoming, and full of passion for earth justice. Each member of the CSSC brings their own unique perspective on sustainability issues but we come together and work with our strengths and through our weaknesses to shake up this world for good. I’m so glad I went, and shared great food and random hugs with such incredible people. Looking forward to campaigning, outreach, and the Convergence in Butte!
-Emili Abdel-Ghany, Council Co-Rep, UC Davis

It is so fantastic coming back to the retreat for the fourth time around and seeing seasoned and new CSSCers alike tackle some of the hardest questions facing any student-run organization. These folks are building bonds not just for this academic year, but for the rest of their lives and I am grateful for the opportunity to be a part of this amazing experience. I will never forget the moment when Butte College took on the challenge of becoming the first community college campus ever to host a convergence over a (very) late night snack of organic veggie pizza. UBUNTU!
-Kristina Davtyan, CSSC Operating Team Co-Chair, California State University of Los Angeles

This years summer leadership retreat marked my first year with CSSC. Looking back to my very first retreat last summer, the CSSC has grown tremendously! We are now in the midst of our second Power Vote campaign and I could not be more excited about the future of CSSC. At every retreat our leaders get to connect on many different levels with one another, and it is through these connections that we form the bonds needed to work in unity and passion for a more sustainable tomorrow. I am so blessed to know and work with such wonderful people.
-Wendy Myvett, CSSC Council Co-Chair, City College of San Francisco.

In my experience in the youth sustainability movement there is no other organization that does what the CSSC does, not only are its students bright, intelligent, but they are some of the most loving, caring individuals I have met. This year at the Summer leadership Retreat new attendees well as veteran CSSC’ers came together to share best practices and pass the flame to the next generation. It is through this non-hierarchical snowflake model that the CSSC’s web is ever growing and empowering new youth leaders. The retreat is a chance to come together as a close-knit family and begin planning and strategizing for the upcoming semester. This group displays the finest work and play ethics around, providing an environment of intense learning and intimate bonding.
Thanks CSSC!!!!
-Kevin Killion, Convergence Coordinator, Butte College

*If you are interested in getting involved with the CSSC, we hope to see you at our Fall 2012 Convergence at Butte College — stay tuned for updates!*

Photos by Tia Tyler

Sam Gross

I joined the CSSC Board as an alumni to continue my work with this amazing organization.sam_gross

SCHOOL: Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, 2011
MAJOR: Environmental Science, Policy and Planning
PAST ROLES: Cal Poly Council Rep, Power Shift Trainer
HOMETOWN: Greenbrae, California

About Me

Sam currently resides in San Francisco where he enjoys the exciting urban setting and the beautiful open space that spans northern California. He is an avid mountain biker, skier, foodie, and a lover of music. Sam plans on returning to school to receive his masters in City and Regional Planning. His goal is to plan and design communities with responsible land use and to develop more sustainable transportation systems.

How I Got Involved In CSSC

Sam first joined the CSSC in 2009, when he and 2 other Cal Poly students traveled to the UN Climate Change conference in Copenhagen as members of the CSSC youth delegation. He has been fully engaged with the CSSC every since. In 2010 he became President of Cal Poly’s CSSC Chapter, the Empower Poly Coalition, an organization that connects environmental and humanitarian efforts within the Cal Poly community.

The Area of Sustainability That Interests Me Most

Urban Planning and Design, Real Food, Socially Responsible Business, and Transportation

The Role of Student Action in Sustainability

As educated individuals it is our responsibility to collaborate and share our knowledge with the world and create a livable environment by designing, planning, organizing and building for the future.

Sustainability Projects I’ve Worked On

  • the Green Initiative Fund
  • Green Chef (sustainable cooking competition)
  • Real Food Challenge
  • Fair Trade Universities
  • multiple Earth Day Festivals

 

Ketchup on Ketchup

I recently saw a Heinz ketchup ad that read, “I put ketchup on my ketchup.” I can relate to that sentiment. While I do love the classics like Heinz, summer’s bounty is too delicious to ignore. Add so, I made this ketchup that elevated a humble weekday meal of homefries and vegetables to something so much more delectable. Not only does this ketchup go where normal ketchup belongs on potatoes of all sorts and lots of veggie burgers, but is at home as a bread dip, sandwich spread, fried egg topping, or even as an Indian chutney. Now, keep in mind this is not just your standard ketchup with only tomatoes; this recipe uses eggplant, onions, and a plethora of spices. I like the extra silkiness the eggplant lends and caramelized onions serve as a fantastic hearty foundation for the other layers of flavors to nestle into.

Hearty Homemade Ketchup

For this recipe, you will need:
¼ cup olive oil
½ a medium onion, chopped finely
½ a medium eggplant, in ~1/2 inch cubes
3 medium tomatoes, chopped roughly
3 cloves garlic
Pinch ground cloves
2 teaspoons dry mustard (the spice, not the condiment)
½ (or more) teaspoons chili powder
½ cup sugar, honey, agave or other sweetener
2/3 cup vinegar (start slow and taste as you go; I like an acidic bite!)
Salt to taste

Tools:
Large saucepan
Knife
Cutting board
Garlic press
Spoon
Blender, optional

Process:
1. Heat the oil in the pan over medium heat.
2. Add the onions. When the onions are translucent, add the eggplant. If the eggplant sticks, gradually add more oil.
3. When the eggplant is soft, add the tomatoes, garlic, cloves, mustard, and chili. Simmer over medium heat until smooth and silky.
4. Add the sweetener, vinegar, and salt. Taste and remove from heat.
5. Optional: blend until smooth. I made it chunky and it was a nice divergence from the pureed grocery store kind.

Thanks to Rachel for yet another charming cartoon.

Sustainability, Here at Home with the Winnemem Wintu

By Ambrosia K. Krinsky

I recently returned from a four day Coming of Age Ceremony with the Winnemem Wintu on the banks of the McCloud River in Shasta County. This experience has had me thinking a lot about the connections between culture, environment and sustainability. What struck me the hardest during the ceremony was the fact that it took over 100 volunteers organizing to protect this sacred space for the safe passage of one girl into womanhood to occur.

Estimates have been made which put the number of Winnemem Wintu people living along the McCloud between 14,000-20,000 prior to first contact. The consequent murder by settlers and disease reduced this number to 395 by 1900. Now tribal members fight with the support of many allies to hold on to the ecological integrity of their land base, their traditional knowledges and their spiritual practices. The land I stood on along the McCloud River is one of many historic Winnemem village sites (now a state owned camp ground open to all members of the public). Unfortunately, many of the other village sites and sacred sites are currently covered by tens of millions of cubic feet of water and materials due to Shasta Dam. In fact, the Puberty Rock where the young girl meets her tribe for the first time as a woman is covered by water for much of the year, leaving a very small window of time in which the ceremony can occur. This Coming of Age Ceremony was very important for the tribe, as it was the last year it could be performed while the young woman (who is next in line to be the spiritual leader of the tribe) is an appropriate age.

 

Since the ceremony was revived in 2006 only four women have been able to successfully complete this rite of passage. Prior to this revival the last ceremony took place in 1927 (well before the construction of the dam). From 2006 through to this last ceremony the Forestry Service had not granted the tribe a closure for the necessary portion of the river. As a result there were two years in which harassment by local non-native persons (including yelling racial slurs and flashing of breasts) have made the ceremonies difficult to perform with the level of concentration they require. This year after tremendous tribal and public pressure the Forestry Service did mandate a closure. Unfortunately, the Forestry Service used this closure against the Winnemem, who had brought in a motorized boat (which they had asked for in the usage permit). The day after the ceremony Chief Sisk was given two citations of violation totaling $10,000 or a year in jail.

For the Winnemem Wintu it has been one long battle after another, with many more remaining ahead. They survived the physical genocide with much of their culture intact and now work constantly to prevent its loss via the cultural genocide currently being waged on them by: the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), the Forestry Service and residents of Redding who would prefer to think of them as a page in a history book rather than the vibrant, thriving culture that they are.

In a blog for the CSSC published on June 6, 2012 titled “Spirituality and Sustainability” Meredith Jacobson wrote, “I believe in our ability to study past cultures who have lived far more sustainably then we have, and see that they lived intensely spiritual lives”. While I agree with many of the sentiments Meredith offers in her blog, I wish to point out a few problematic issues which could arise from this sentence. The first is an assumption that these “past cultures” (which I read as indigenous cultures) are no longer in existence. Many of them, such as the Winnemem Wintu and Achuar of Ecuador (which she mentions) are most definitely still alive! If they no longer exist in and interact with their land base as their ancestors did, we need to examine why. We must also keep in mind that indigenous peoples have the right to self-determination; they are free to decide their own level of participation or non-participation in economic development.

Like many other tribes in California, the Winnemem Wintu are not federally recognized, having been removed from the US government’s list of recognized tribes in 1985. Federal recognition provides agovernment-to-government relationship between the US federal government and the sovereign state that is a tribe. According to Chief Sisk in an interview with the Mending News, 90% of Native Americans in the state of California are not federally recognized. This excludes them from funding for services such as housing, healthcare and scholarships. Federal recognition also bestows protections for religious freedom and access to sacred objects (like eagle feathers, which are illegal for non-Indians to collect). The tribe wants to know why they were deleted from the official narrative and when the BIA plans to reinstate them. It took Chief Sisk and her Nephew Arron 24 days of fasting to gain the attention of the BIA and secure a meeting with an official to discuss reinstatement.

The second point I would like to make is not a response to Meredith but rather a response to new wave culture in general. We need to be very careful to not romanticize Native Americans and indigenous peoples of the world and avoid co-opting their spiritual practices. Their ways of knowing are simply that, “theirs”. We do not know these teachings to be true as they do, they were not passed down to us. Adopting them without recognition of this is dangerous and disrespectful. The reality is that we cannot use indigenous ways of knowing to fill the void colonization has left in our hearts and souls, but we can support indigenous rights as granted under customary law and as can be enacted by the ratification of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). We can support the Winnemem Wintu by respecting their ways of knowing and working to see the UNDRIP implemented within our borders. Plans are being made to raise the level of Shasta dam, which would cover what remains of their accessible sacred sites (in addition to having a massively negative environmental impact); we can work to prevent this from happening.

 

 

For more information on the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/DRIPS_en.pdf

 

For more information about joining the campaign in support of the Winnemem Wintu’s cultural and
traditional rights:
http://www.winnememwintu.us/
I would like to thank the Winnemem Wintu for sharing their ancestral homeland and sacred ceremony with me and Michael Preston (Student and Activist at U.C. Berkeley, and Son of Chief Sisk) for inviting me to the ceremony and for his contributions to this blog.

Ambrosia K. Krinsky


Hints of Summer

Sorry for the long delay in recipe goodness. Since my last post an embarrassingly long time ago, I’ve been doing things like settling into a fantastic job, choosing a grad school, and trying to find a place to live that is affordable, where I can have compost pile, and where my cat won’t get smushed by cars. I’ve been spending a lot of time with the Excel “pro vs. con” template and I’ve noticed that my highest weight factors usually were food related. As I was telling one of my friends, “I really can’t consider living in a place where my food isn’t transported only by human powered vehicle.” What a bike + food snob.

This week the forecast predicts temperatures in the low 90s; summer is nipping the spring bud. In our CSA we received a tomato and 3 (!) zucchini, which were both grown in an unheated greenhouse, but still grown here. Summer is coming and fast! We’ve been getting little baskets of strawberries in the CSA for weeks now, but with the sudden heat they’ve gone from tasting like wet Styrofoam to fragrant, delicious berries.

Israeli style couscous is a bit different than “normal” couscous – it is spherical and much larger. I think it has a nice bite (I’m not a fan of how mushy normal couscous gets) and is traditionally toasted prior to boiling, giving it a pretty golden color and mouth filling taste. If you can’t find Israeli couscous, substitute orzo, shells, or another small pasta, but not normal couscous.

Here’s what has been happening in the kitchen:

Honey, I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine.


Strawberry Juice
For this recipe, you will need:
1 cup fresh strawberries, hulled
3-4 medium-ish frozen strawberries (to make it cold!)
2 tablespoons of honey (unfiltered, preferably local to combat seasonal allergies)
1-2 cups water
Mint spring

Tools:
Knife
Measuring things
Blender or food processor or hand-mashing dedication

Process:
1. Place all strawberries, honey, and water in the blender.
2. Whirl until pureed.
3. Taste and consider more honey or water.
4. Pour into glass/es (I suggest hoarding it all for yourself) and garnish with the mint spring so you feel like you are on vacation.

Zucchini Israeli Couscous
Modified from Animal, Miracle, Vegetable

For this recipe, you will need:
1 ½ cups Israeli style couscous
2 tablespoons olive oil
1-2 quarts water for boiling couscous
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 spring onion, chopped (including some green parts)
2 cloves garlic, whole and unpeeled
1 to many zucchini, with peel, shredded
1-2 sprigs thyme
¼ cup nutritional yeast
2 tablespoons (or more) milk (almond, soy, rice, etc. all work great)
Salt and pepper to taste
¼ cup fresh basil, chopped

Tools:
Medium-large heavy bottomed pan or Dutch oven
Spoon
Mesh colander
Knife
Grater
Garlic press
Measuring things

Process:
1. Place the couscous and oil in the pan and cook over medium high heat. Stir occasionally.
2. Continue toasting until the majority of couscous pearls are golden brown and the pan is emitting a heavenly fragrance, similar to baking bread.
3. Add water (watch out for splattering!) and stir to break up any chunks of pasta. Boil over medium heat until the pasta is cooked through.
4. Drain couscous into the colander. Rise excess starch off.
5. In the same pan, add another 2 tablespoons olive oil with the onions. Saute over medium heat until translucent.
6. Add garlic, zucchini and thyme. Saute for another 2-3 minutes.
7. Add the couscous back in with the nutritional yeast, milk, salt, and pepper.
8. Top with chopped basil. (If you don’t have fresh basil – skip it. No need for topping beautiful pasta with gray leaf confetti).

Thanks to the beautiful and talented Rachel Silverstein for the glorious drawings.

The Lexicon of Sustainability

“Words are the building blocks for new ideas. They have the power to activate change and transform societies.” – The Lexicon of Sustainability

The sustainability world is full of words. Quite a lot of them. Some are words that the general public uses and understands, some are not. Some words have been used and manipulated by politicians and advertisers for their agendas – greenwashing. We all use words when defending our ideas, when speaking for our campaigns, when describing our developing projects.

Douglas Gayeton and Laura Howard-Gayeton know that words have power. They recognize the need for a deeper and more widespread understanding of sustainability rhetoric. They have spent the past three years working on a project they call “The Lexicon of Sustainability” – a collection of informational, photographic art that exposes the stories of individuals working in the sustainable food system, and the concepts that go along with their work.

http://www.lexiconofsustainability.com/pop-up-art-shows/greencollar/

The website states the simple premise of the Lexicon of Sustainability: “People can’t be expected to live more sustainable lives if they don’t even know the most basic terms and principles that define sustainability.” And so these two visionaries set out to talk to people, to take photo and video footage of the work that they do, to define the terminology that is wrapped up in their stories and their values. Their media, which can be explored in depth on their website, includes stories and ideas contributed by almost two hundred leaders of the food movement. Themes range from “cage free” to “biodiversity” to “urban farmer.” There are plans to expand the project outside of the food realm. Soon the site will launch a “Social Network of Ideas” that will allow individuals to define terms and engage in virtual conversation regarding meaning and terminology. There is infinite room for growth and expansion.

Check it out for yourself! Spend a good chunk of time perusing the site. The premise of the project and the crafted images are bound to promote thought. Do we need a “lexicon of sustainability”? How do we ensure that this type of media serves a greater purpose than simply giving a privileged audience something cool to look at?

I think there is great potential here. It’s about reclaiming our own words. It’s about wiping away the greenwashing and returning to the root of the rhetoric, which exists to describe ideas and systems that have been around for thousands of years. Reclaiming meaning. Occupying the dictionary, if you will. If what we’re after is transforming our societies, transforming our lexicon might be an essential step. Students can play a pivotal role in the process, because students are educated, active, passionate, and engaged (at least in the CSSC, they are!). I sincerely hope a large body of students mobilizes to join this “social network of ideas,” to contribute their wealth of knowledge and help cultivate this living organism of words and concepts. So stay tuned – the Lexicon of Sustainability is something to follow.

http://www.lexiconofsustainability.com/pop-up-art-shows/farmtotable/

 

An Odious Investment: Moving Beyond Coal at UC Berkeley

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Katie Hoffman, UC Berkeley student and CSSC member

Why is a world-renowned public university that prides itself on being a leader for social change, civil rights and progressive education investing without transparency in one of the most significant environmental problems of our time? Known for the infamous 1960s free speech movement, UC Berkeley has long been a diverse and vibrant community ripe with students and faculty willing to vocalize injustices at home and abroad. Except for one. To date, a couple of large endowments at UC Berkeley are heavily invested in the worst coal companies on the planet—known to many as the “filthy fifteen.” In fact, UCB is one of several institutions across the country invested in coal companies that have been responsible for widespread environmental degradation and gross human health abuses.

Coal is one of the dirtiest fuel sources on the planet and its environmental and health impacts are greatest on children, pregnant women, low-income communities and communities of color. The use and extraction of coal is contributing to global climate change, permanent damage to ecosystems, and an array of human health issues ranging from emphysema and mercury poisoning to death. In fact, it is estimated the ten worst offenders of the filthy fifteen—including companies like AEP, Duke and Southern— are responsible for upward of 17,000 deaths and tens of thousands of heart attacks per year.

So, even though UCB does not use coal-power for energy on campus, why on earth is the university investing millions—some of which comes from student fees— in an unsustainable, hazardous and frankly indefensible industry? The truth is coal investment is convenient, but that does not make it morally or economically wise. In fact, as former Apartheid divestment activist and Executive Director of the Wallace Global Fund Ellen Dorsey has argued, the coal industry is the most economically vulnerable of the polluting industries. Coal is no longer cheap and abundant, and the cost to retrofit and maintain existing plants is skyrocketing.

Like the South Africa divestment campaign run by American university students in the 1970s and 1980s that helped topple Apartheid, the UCB community must join students across the nation who are demanding socially responsible investment on their campuses. It’s about time the UCB community demands our university withdraws financial support for the filthy 15, making a clear statement about our commitment to investing in companies that don’t profit from the systematic degradation of the natural world and gross violations of human rights. Like those who came before us, it is our time to refuse to passively take part in the operation of the machine—a machine fueled in part by investment in one of the dirtiest fuel sources known to man. To secure the chance of making this planet a more livable and just place for future generations, we must hold our investors accountable for their decisions and demand reinvestment in environmentally conscious and economically sustainable alternatives.

 

Voices from the Spring 2012 Convergence

Photo by Tia Tyler

From April 27th - April 29th, over 400 students from across the state of California gathered at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo for a weekend of workshops, speakers, live music, and camping. The theme of this convergence was building a resoNATION - inspiring students to join together to make a positive, resounding impact in the world. We all have unique perspectives, skills, and experiences, and the California Student Sustainability Coalition (CSSC) is about bringing those individual resonations into one HUGE resoNATION.

And that is what we did. Most of the 30 workshops offered were student-led, and topics varied from “Transforming White Privilege” to “Agro Eco Coffee” to “Ending Corporate Personhood.” Larry Lansburgh, producer of the film “Dream People of the Amazon,” delivered a thought-provoking and inspirational keynote address about the power of community and perseverance against all odds. After a long day of workshops (and delicious, vegan, sustainable food) we all danced our hearts out to the tunes of The Willows, who played an energizing set for us at SLO Creek Farms.

The CSSC is built on the principle that sustainability has three intertwined threads: ecological, economic, and social. The convergence was a time to explore all of those threads both intellectually and experientially, by opening our minds and our hearts to one another.

Between workshops, over meals or while tossing frisbees, friends were made and conversations had regarding how we can make change in our own communities and on our own campuses. How we can build a resoNATION. Jordan Lambert, Tessa Salzman, and Yamina Pressler did a fabulous job for coordinating this year’s spring convergence. Across the board, students agreed that it was one of the best ones yet. Those three amazing organizers, along with the Empower Poly Coalition and the California Student Sustainability Coalition, worked long and hard to create this space for sustainable collaboration. But rather than write more about the experience, here is a video that encompasses the diversity of voices as well as the common experience that permeated throughout the weekend.

Watch the video here!

If you attended the convergence, I hope this brings back positive memories, and if you did not, I hope this inspires you to come to the next one! The CSSC puts together these magical weekends once a semester - so don’t miss out!

 

Photo by Tia Tyler

 

 

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