Iowa State University
EN-7: Employee Educators Program

The Sustainability Working Group is responsible for building upon the areas identified as priorities by and the guidance given from the sustainability advisory committee related to the engagement of the campus community in sustainability. Outreach is centered around increasing awareness of sustainability initiatives and opportunities and furthering and enhancing educational efforts of the Office of Sustainability. The working group includes representation from all major sustainability components and functions across campus.

Sustainability Working Group members are appointed by their representative alliances.

The Working Group takes part in informational dialogue and planning/visioning meetings throughout the year, based upon the goals and priorities of the advisory committee. From these meetings objectives and action items are identified that each representative will then work in their representative alliances to develop strategies and implementation that best fit their constituency.

The Sustainability Working Group is chaired by Iowa State University's Director of Sustainability and directly affiliated with the Office of Sustainability.

Green Teams are groups of faculty, staff, and students who have voluntarily come together with the goal of furthering sustainability practices, policies, behavior, and opportunities at Iowa State University. These teams have organized in conjunction with various alliances representing specific buildings, colleges, departments, and functional areas across campus.

Green Teams members are appointed by their representative alliances.

Green teams collaborate with each other on green initiatives for a particular building or department, which then allows members to reach out to others in the organization and spread sustainable ideas. Teams gather and discuss information during meetings, allowing educators to become knowledgeable in sustainability-related issues and opportunities within each team's area.

Green Teams work closely with Iowa State University's Director of Sustainability related to obtaining connections to resources and collaboration opportunities. Additionally, dialogue meetings are held each semester and on as-needed basis as determined by the Green Teams. Meeting discussions include challenges, successes, strategies, campus sustainability initiatives and opportunities and strategic planning.

College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Sustainability Task Force: The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Sustainability Task Force, focuses on ways to involve CALS faculty, staff and students in a dialogue around sustainability to better position the college in addressing critical economic, environmental and social/community issues facing agriculture. This college-wide conversation is both about sharing what we are doing currently and listening to input on what we may consider doing differently in the future to enhance and infuse the ideas and goals of sustainability in the classroom, labs and in the communities and partnerships we daily engage with. One specific focus of the task force is the development of a college-wide dialogue on sustainability. The dialogue would consider how the college can focus and more fully engage in sustainability across our research, education and extension and outreach missions. The intent of the dialogue is to better position the college in addressing critical economic, environmental and social/community issues facing agriculture. (1,202 employees served). https://www.cals.iastate.edu/faculty-staff Tall Grass Prairie Project This Tall Grass Prairie Project selects up to 20 faculty members to participate in yearly workshops. In order to participate, faculty participants must be committed to integrating one or more sustainability components into their course(s).The Tall Grass Prairie Project’s first workshop took place in May 2012 with a group of 16 attendees and was led by Dr. James Farrell from St. Olaf’s College. After the participants worked in the summer at revising their syllabi, the participants gathered again for an exchange of ideas and plans. The 2015 workshop engaged 18 faculty from five colleges teaching 20 courses to 2,400 students.The Office of the Provost and the Colleges of participating faculty fund the Tall Grass Prairie project. This program is also affiliated with the Live Green! Initiative, and receives support from Iowa State University’s Office of Sustainability. (35 employees served).