Lunch Meetings

Monday, October 15

Aiming Higher: The Rio+20 Report on Higher Education's Role in Sustainable Development

Session Organizers:

  • Kim Smith (Portland Community College)
  • Leanne Denby (Macquarie University)

Our presentation will highlight the efforts made by an international consortium of educators and higher education leaders at Rio+20, the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, to persuade delegates to support the critical roles higher education plays in reaching sustainability goals.

AASHE Non-Member Meeting: Why join AASHE?

Session Organizers:

  • Nikia Johnson (AASHE)
  • Lisa Shusko (AASHE)
  • Seann Sweeney (AASHE)

Brief overview of AASHE membership benefits including our invaluable resources, opportunities to connect with AASHE's diverse and inspired community, and many others. A Q/A will follow the brief overview.

College & University Recycling Coalition Annual Business Meeting Lunch

Session Organizer:

  • Donny T Addison (Auburn University) addisdt@auburn.edu

Join CURC’s steering committee for our annual business meeting luncheon. Grab lunch from conference catering and bring your plate to our meeting for a brief update on CURC’s status and plans for the coming year.

Higher Education Associations Sustainability Consortium: Meeting & Discussion

Session Organizers:

  • Judy Walton, HEASC Coordinator (AASHE)
  • Debra Rowe, HEASC Advisor (US Partnership for Education for Sustainable Development)

Join us to discuss how higher education associations are collaborating to advance sustainability on campuses and in each professional sector. Learn about the current HEASC associations and their resources for administrative leaders and faculty, including business officers, operations and purchasing, student affairs, sustainability staff, and recreational services staff. Explore the purposes and membership of HEASC and how this powerful network can benefit you and your sustainability efforts. We will discuss the exciting projects of HEASC Sustainability Fellows, and key events planned for Campus Sustainability Day (Oct 24). All are invited to attend this session and provide input.

I Am Here Now Because of...And This is Where I Want to Be Next...

Session Organizer:

  • Jack Byrne (Middlebury College)

Sustainability is a profession and a passion for most of the people who come to an AASHE conference. We are, on balance, despairing optimists, utopian idealists, cold-eyed realists, manic-depressive mover/shakers, do-gooders, social entreprenuers and mostly ordinary people with extraordinary and unique talents and vision - all aimed at creating a better future. A noble endeavor indeed at a time which is begging for meaningful change.

"So how did you get here?" is a really interesting question. So is "What are you going to do next?"

This informal roundtable session is open to all sustainability staff or faculty with a few years on the job and who are asking these kinds of questions and looking for some perspective and who have some to give. Please bring one image, quote, book or film title, object, memory, very short story, or other symbol that embodies your take on where we are as a profession and where we need to take it. And don't take it too seriously - just something to get the conversation going or move it along.

The purpose of this session is simply to have an open, sincere and informal dialogue about being an evolving sustainability professional in an evolving profession. This session will be facilitated lightly by sustainability professionals who are good at it and who have long - wide and different perspectives in the profession.

Integrated Planning: A Society for College and University Planning (SCUP) Imperative

Session Organizer:

  • Phyllis Haight Grummon (Society for College and University Planning)

Join SCUP leaders and staff in a short presentation on integrated planning processes and a facilitated discussion, over lunch, of what it takes to create an effective planning process on campuses.

Northeast Campus Sustainability Consortium: Regional Networking Lunch

Session Organizer:

  • Daniel Roth (Cornell University)

Join the Northeast Campus Sustainability Consortium (NECSC) for a lunch time regional networking event. Founded in 2004, each year NECSC has convened over 80 institutions of higher education from the northeast United States and Eastern Canadian Provinces. Meet with sustainability professionals, faculty, and students from your region and learn more about the value of participating in a regional network.

The meet-up will also be an opportunity to give input on the themes and sessions of the spring 2013 NECSC annual conference. The northeast region includes New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, New Jersey, Vermont, Quebec, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Prince Edward Island, New York, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Nova Scotia, although the meet-up is open to all schools.

STARS Governance Lunch, Private

Session Organizer:

  • Chris Pelton (AASHE)

This lunch is a meet-and-greet opportunity for STARS Steering Committee Members and Technical Advisors. The lunch will be informal and is not mandatory. However, specific STARS topics as they relate to the STARS governance may be discussed.

Teacher Educators Luncheon

Session Organizer:

  • Paul Rowland (AASHE)

Teacher Educators are invited to come together to discuss the status of sustainability in higher education, how to move it forward, and who to work with.

UMACS Networking Session

Session Organizer:

  • Erika Bailey-Johnson (Bemidji State University)

Get together with students, faculty, and staff from the Upper Midwest Association for Campus Sustainability (UMACS). Discuss progress and challenges at your institution.

Tuesday, October 16

3rd Annual Community College Meet-Up: The Green Genome Project

Session Organizers:

  • Todd Cohen (American Association of Community Colleges)
  • Debra Rowe (U.S. Partnership for Education for Sustainable Development)

Join us for a lively discussion of the challenges and success of the 2-year college within the higher education sustainability movement. AACC’s SEED Center will highlight its Green Genome projects, designed to help community colleges advance and align green-focused workforce programs with broader campus sustainability efforts. The session will include a free Green Institutional Self-Assessment tool (developed by AACC, industry, federal agencies, and other national experts) for community colleges to quickly gauge, along a series of competencies, how well they may be leading these initiatives today—and where to prioritize enhancements in the future. The tool is designed to work within the STARS framework.

Campus Carbon Inventories

Session Organizers:

  • Julie Paquette (Sightlines)
  • Jennifer Andrews (Clean Air-Cool Planet)

Clean Air-Cool Planet and Sightlines partnered in 2011 to redevelop the Campus Carbon CalculatorTM as a dynamic, web-based tool in order to streamline the transition from greenhouse gas analysis to action. Come hear from campus leaders about how they use the calculator to create, maintain, validate, benchmark, and ultimately use inventory data to affect change on campus. Get your CCC inventory, projections, and solutions modules questions answered, and bounce your challenges off of expert advisors including your peers. Opportunities to participate in future research, development, and networking will also be presented.

Challenges to Greening Your Campus Facilities Discussion

Session Organizer:

  • Kristin Ferguson (U.S. Green Building Council) kferguson@usgbc.org

Are you a champion for greening facilities on your campus? More energy efficient buildings? Better access to alternate transportation? More green space around and in between your buildings? Greener purchasing? As a green campus champion, have you faced challenges that have made the greening of these same facilities difficult? No budget? Unwieldy bureaucracy? Lack of time to do it all?

If so, the Center for Green Schools at the U.S. Green Building Council would like to invite you join us for a facilitated conversation about the walls you have run up against and strategies for success that other participants have realized on their campuses. We invite you to bring your honest stories and veteran experience to this vibrant discussion as we talk through how to realize progress in difficult circumstances for green facilities champions across the country.

Higher Education and Student Affairs Networking Luncheon

Session Organizers:

  • M. Shernell Smith (Carnegie Mellon University)
  • Vernon Wall (ACPA)
  • Pamela Su (Sonoma State University)
  • Thomas Gerald Kirch (Oregon State University)

Drop by and join your student affairs colleagues for a conversation about the role of student affairs professionals in the sustainability movement. Hosted by the NASPA Knowledge Community on Sustainability, ACPA Task Force on Sustainability and NIRSA Commission for Sustainable Communities. (Hosted by NASPA, ACPA & NIRSA)

International Lunch Meeting

Session Organizer:

  • Rose Johnson (AASHE Board of Directors International Task Force)
  • Burt Klein (AASHE Board of Directors International Task Force)

Members of the international community who are attending the AASHE conference are invited to join the members of the AASHE International Task Force and staff for an opportunity to discuss ways that AASHE can work with organizations and institutions outside the US and Canada. We will also review some of AASHE's recent successes in working across the oceans.

Networking Meetup Lunch for Sustainability Professionals in Higher Education

Session Organizers:

  • Jeremy Friedman (New York University)
  • Aurora Winslade (University of Hawaii West O'ahu)

Among the huge number of attendees at the AASHE Conference, this is an opportunity to enjoy a working lunch for full-time higher education sustainability professionals specifically. Attendees will have a chance to network, build relationships, and identify shared interests and sources of expertise. With the rapid growth of the sustainability in higher education field there is a growing number of newly- or recently-hired staff. We're often isolated as the only specialist in our field on our campuses, and there aren't many opportunities to connect with others who are experiencing and tackling similar challenges.

This is a special time during the AASHE conference, not only to learn from one another, but also to be inspired and reinvigorated in our ongoing work to “be the change we wish to see in the world.” The format will involve time for informal networking (and eating), as well as an opportunity to engage in “collaborative coaching” with one another. Attendees are invited to come with one case study / ongoing challenge in mind that they would like to consider in consultation with their colleagues.