University of California, Los Angeles
PAE-20: Inter-Campus Collaboration on Sustainability

UCLA has been an active presenter at the National AASHE Conference and at the California Higher Education Conference (see details under additional collaboration). While gathering data for STARS, UCLA Sustainability presented in a webinar through AASHE to share best practices in data management with other universities who were beginning the STARS process, and created some useful resources for data management that were shared through AASHE's website.

UCLA is a member of the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment (ACUPCC), a high-visibility effort to address global climate disruption undertaken by a network of colleges and universities that have made institutional commitments to eliminate net greenhouse gas emissions from specified campus operations, and to promote the research and educational efforts of higher education to equip society to re-stabilize the earth’s climate. Its mission is to accelerate progress towards climate neutrality and sustainability by empowering the higher education sector to educate students, create solutions, and provide leadership-by-example for the rest of society. UCLA is a core member of the California Student Sustainability Coalition (CSSC) – which is a network of students and colleges that are actively working to transform their educational institutions and communities into models of sustainability. The campus’ student organization E3-Ecology, Economy, Equity is an official chapter of the CSSC and represents UCLA at bi-annual Convergences with colleges and universities from across California. Additionally, UCLA alumni and staff are on the CSSC Board of Directors, including Housing & Hospitality’s Sustainability Analyst, Rebecca Miller. American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment (ACUPCC): http://www.presidentsclimatecommitment.org/signatories/list California Student Sustainability Coalition (CSSC): http://www.sustainabilitycoalition.org/

UCLA collaborates significantly with other universities to share best practices in sustainability. UCLA works closely with the other 9 campuses in the UC System, participating in multiple monthly conference calls with other sustainability officers and staff to share best practices. UCLA also works with the other UC campuses to develop the system-wide Sustainable Practices Policy. Sue Santon, Associate Vice Chancellor of Capital Programs, Capital Planning and Finance serves as the UCLA representative to the UC Systemwide Sustainability Steering Committee. UCLA is an active member of AASHE and attends the national conference every year and has presented and shared best practices there. In addition, UCLA's Sustainability Coordinator serves on the steering committee of the California Higher Education Sustainability Conference, helping to organize one of the largest higher education sustainability conferences in the nation. This conference is attended by staff, faculty, and students from UC campuses, California State University campuses, community colleges, and private colleges throughout the state, usually around 1000 attendees. The conference is structured to encourage sharing best practices directly peer to peer among the campuses. In addition to helping organize the conference, multiple departments from UCLA participate and present and share best practices, including UCLA Transportation and UCLA Energy Services. In conjunction with the statewide conference, UCLA has also helped organize an annual workshop for sustainability coordinators from around the state, which takes place before the conference. UCLA also helped spearhead a regional collaboration and quarterly meeting with local campuses in Southern California- CalTech, Pomona, USC, Loyola and others. This year UCLA Sustainability advised UCLA students in organizing a region-wide job fair across these campuses. UCLA's Sustainability Coordinator has also counseled and been a resource to students and staff at other universities across the nation on a variety of sustainability topics. UCLA Facilities Management also collaborates with other campuses through the Partnership for Performance (P4P) group and shares best practices including energy efficiency and conservation and climate initiatives.