Sustainability Meetings

• September 9, 2010
• October 14, 2010
• November 11, 2010
• February 10, 2011

September 9, 2010: Kick-off Meeting

After a brief introduction of the members of Sustainable Pratt and history of the club, we enjoyed our wonderful lunch while watching amazing presentations of Pratt Institute's "Living Lab" (previously known as the Green Dorm Project) and the West Elm project. The Living Lab was a huge success, and is serving as a prototype for sustainability in the Willoughby Hall dorm building. The West Elm project included new graduates from Pratt Institute teaming up with West Elm to create a line of eco-friendly home office furniture called "Pratt Home Office Collection." There will be a reception TBD. Announcements made include "The Air We Breathe in NYC" and focus on Indoor Environmental Air Quality. For more information on these announcements and more, check the "Announcements" page.

October 14, 2010: Indoor Environmental Quality

This month's meeting began with an overview of the PALSS event from Deb Johnson. She explained that the summit was a huge success, with nearly 100% attendance from 35 private art schools nationwide. The overall problem defined by the Summit is that no one really knows what a sustainable world looks like, and our goal should be to create that vision. Following the PALSS overview was Gita Nanden with a presentation on Indoor Environmental Quality. We hope to have a slideshow version of the presentation up on the site soon, so keep checking back! Other announcements included the upcoming TEDxBrooklyn: One Moves Many, PVC off campus, A call for interest by PIPSA for their city-wide diversity conference to be held in May 2011, and AIANY's Design like you give a damn: Live! Check out other Announcements on the Announcements page.

November 11, 2010: Indoor Environmental Quality + Green Week 2011

At this month's meeting the Director of Health and Counseling, Martha Cedarholm, presented the topic of Student Health (both mental and physical) in relation to Pratt's Indoor Environment as well as Pratt's culture and other factors.
Here are just a few of the many interesting things that Martha touched on in her presentation:

-       We have a wonderful medical facility on the first level of Willoughby Hall, and a Psych office located in Higgins Hall.
-       Based on survey results, Pratt students (compared to the general population of students nationwide) feel unhealthy.
-       Pratt has a high density of students with disabilities, i.e. ADD, with two times more psychiatric issues than the rest of the country.
-       In general, students feel that attention is directed towards the upkeep of the grounds at Pratt, and the Interiors are ignored.
-       Amount of equipment/exposure accidents has decreased exponentially.

If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to email Martha at mcedarho@pratt.edu

Deb Johnson mentioned that there is a digital Material Handbook available to students and faculty for project materials that are less harmful to the student and environment - If you are interested in obtaining a copy, please contact Deb at djohn377@pratt.edu

After Martha's presentation, we moved on to New Business. We discussed that the survey for Indoor Environmental Quality on campus is going to be narrowed to a more specific location. This way the project scale is much easier to handle and it can be treated like another Living Lab.

Next we discussed Green Week 2011. The dates of Green Week have been set for March 28^th through April 2^nd, so mark your calendars! We are open to suggestions and ideas for the event, so if you have any, please let Environmental Coalition know. Some ideas discussed at the event included a Student Government led 'abandoned lot clean up," NYPIRG with Cool Roofs (painting black roofs silver to reduce energy consumption), and two guest speakers.

February 10, 2011: Co-ordinators Meeting for Green Week 2011

This meeting consisted of creating a more organized, fluid draft of events that will be included in this year's Green Week event. Below is the latest draft of the schedule. If any coordinators see an error or ommission, please notify Tetsu Ohara. Also, be sure to attend our next coordinator meeting on Thursday, February 24th in the Pratt Studio Materials Library!