Florida Institute of Technology
AC-8: Campus as a Living Laboratory

Multiple students and student teams completed formal SUS senior research course projects with diverse offices of the campus community. Many senior projects require engagement with campus offices, students groups, and other staff or faculty to complete. Specific examples of these occur in part in the sections below. Campus-wide engagement on the processing and final results of these projects was also accomplished by student presentation of campus SUS research during the large Northrop Grumman Engineering and Science Showcase event, with these posters made available after within common areas of the Evans library for months each year. Also, this credit was addressed by educating students, faculty and staff in separate events during campus Earth Weeks. Above applies to 2021 through 2023 and prior AASHE submission periods.

Many students have done their formal senior research course projects in the community in the last three years Students built and gave multiple public presentations on advanced city planning work for the cities of Palm Bay, Melbourne Beach, and Indialantic. Many of these and earlier municpal-scale SUSU internships focused on planning, writing, and implementing the first city or town sustainability action plan. This work requires semi-continuous engagement in public committee meetings.

Multiple student senior research projects addressed climate and associated sustainability issues. For example, Several student teams did campus building energy efficiency or renewable energy research on maritime shipping in the Sustainability major and minor senior research projects. These 8-month projects result in professional research posters each spring at the Northrop-Grumman Engineering and Science Showcase on campus. Several examples for 2021-2023 include:
- Advanced building energy audits using the ASHRAE (American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers) Building Energy Quotient website were performed and/or scoped at several of the most energy-consuming buildings on campus, resulting in research posters by several teams of students.
- In 2022, the Sustainability Research Competition at the Northrop Grumman Showcase was won by Alice Pennings for her project on Post-Combustion Carbon Capture for Marine Shipping Applications. She later won the President’s Cup for Best in Show - Sciences with her direct project focus on up-scaled responses to climate change. Her project was based on a paid remote internship with the American Bureau of Shipping.
- In Aug 2023, a new SUS team student senior project was initiated to build a detailed framework for a first Campus Climate Action Plan with a wide array of partners office and other stakeholders around the campus.

We advertise and host site visits for students and visitors at our net-zero, energy efficient Folliard Alumni Center. This exceptional building features a solar powered energy system, with conference and gathering spaces, and serves as a classroom and learning center for students interested in many details of energy efficiency and renewable energy building design.

From above, building energy efficiency audits using the ASHRAE (American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers) Building EQ website were performed and/or scoped at several of the most energy-consuming buildings on campus, resulting in Northrop Grumman research posters by several teams of students. These students learned many detailed features of building energy efficiency through the mentorship of local expert John Constantidine.

- Florida Tech's campus is home to a 16 acre wetland botanical gardens that the Crane Creek Tributary traverses as it nears the Indian River Lagoon. Many student organizations do clean-ups and other activities in this important part of campus as well as many other grounds systems on the property.
- For example, the Keuper Palm Botanical Society works to preserve, cultivate, and share the rich botanical heritage at Florida Tech while fostering a personal connection within the Joy and Gordon Patterson Botanical Garden. This is achieved by students actively restoring and maintaining the garden, so that members of the campus and community may enjoy the garden and the activities within.
- The Ethos Community Garden Club introduces students to residential agriculture opportunities on the grounds in the middle of major dormitories.
- Other student organizations including SGA, Squamish, SOSA, etc., often in partnerships, do campus clean-ups throughout the year.

In the past several years, Civil Engineering majors have done their year long senior research projects on campus transportation issues, including student team projects on design features to make the campus more walkable to reduce automobile congestion.

- The Residence Life Sustainability Committee continues to manage the annual campus Leave Green project - with large volume diversion of spring move-out dormitory wastes to local non-profits for sale or re-purposing. This involves many of dozens of students actively thinking about and contributing to high volume diversion.
- Facilities Operations, with funded student efforts (Adli Sullivan), replaced existing external campus waste receptacles with new systems designed to reduce waste contamination outside of buildings.
- Diverse student organizations organize clean-ups of waste around campus throughout the academic year.

Facilities Operations has been purchasing and installing new water bottle filling stations in multiple old and new water service location around campus. Data on best locations was sourced from SGA and implemented by Facilities student staff.

- Various SGA members are directly involved with the larger student body on diverse SUS planning around campus. This is reflected by the recent addition of a Sustainability Liaison in SGA. Examples include funding and location planning for 6 new solar picnic tables around campus.
- Several students via several campus programs have been involved in coordination and planning in recent years. For example, one Northrop Grumman student senior research project involved an 8 month campus-wide planning exercise with many campus partners to generate a planning template for achieving STARS EN and PA credits.

Many students take courses and attend select events associated with a popular Cultural Competency Certificate program on campus. This program emphasizes Diversity education and awareness among a wide array of student and other campus stakeholders.

- Student SUS senior research projects referenced above occurred in 2021 - 2023 by SUS majors and minors in two courses (Sustainability Project Design, ISC 3999, and Applied Sustainability, ISC 4000).
- Projects by many excellent student organizations (SOSA, SGA, Res Life SUS Comm, others), individual students, and student teams apply to this credit as well as projects by differing university units (e.g. Facilities, Evans Library). All examples, in response to the Y/N questions above, occurred between 2021 and 2023.