http://http://www.nwfecoleaders.org/projects/home/151
1. Where is your project's biggest impact?
Campus, Community
2. What were the goals for your project?
To encourage schools to collect waste and water data and to create a baseline for each school.
3. What strategy did you use?
Operations, Research
1. Did you accomplish the goals you set for this project? Please explain.
We accomplished some of the goals for this project, including encouraging schools to begin collecting this data and gaining valuable knowledge on the barriers of public institutions.
2. Choose your impact measurement from the drop down menu and provide details in the box provided (such as specific numbers or results).
Pounds of trash reduced
We gave 5 different school's a baseline for trash disposed in order for them to reduce their trash next year. They know how much they produced last year and are now taking steps to reduce that using the baselines given to them.
3. When did you begin and complete your project?
This project began in March of 2016 and was partially completed when I presented at a sustainability conference on July 14, 2016. We will continue to expand and build on this project.
4. What was challenging about your project and how did you respond?
The most challenging part of our project was trying to get the institutions to participate. We have 72 institutions that are within our group and we wanted to get data from all 72, which did not happen. We responded by focusing on the data that we did receive and using that to move forward with encouraging other schools.
5. Which groups were involved in this project? Students, faculty, staff or community groups?
The Chicagoland Consortia Collaborative, Chicagoland Network for Sustainability in Higher Education and the Illinois Green Economy Network were all community groups that were involved. Students and faculty from the participating schools were also involved.
6. Was your project funded? If so, how?
Yes, our project is funded by the Global Philanthropy Partnership.
6. How did you communicate about this project and educate the broader campus and/or community?
We communicated about this project through our main project website: consortiacollaborative.com
1. How have you evaluated your project?
Group reflection, Individual reflection, User survey, Scientific assessment, Statistical analysis and review
2. What did you do after your reviewed your project?
Revised goals, Presented your project results at a conference or meeting
1. What was the biggest or best thing you learned from your project?
The biggest thing I learned was how to convince people to give me the time of day, to convince people that collecting data is important to the greater sustainability of campuses.
2. What advice would you give to others working on a similar project?
I would tell them to never give up, never stop looking for data and answers and to always use your resources.
3. Based on your response above, what are your future plans for this project? And are there resources (people, financial, etc.) available to sustain it?
My future plans for this project are to re-launch the project in conjunction with a class funded by the Consortia Collaborative so we can get more data and teach more students about waste and water audits.
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