Page 602 - Sustainable Cities and Communities Design Handbook

“Scrappy” Sustainability at Ohio Wesleyan University Chapter j 29 569

world to Delaware, Ohio, to share their insights. Campus dining halls now
feature vegan options, many more local food options, and a general movement
toward serving less meat. The recycling program has been successful for many
years and has transitioned from a grassroots effort (begun in the 1980s) by
students emptying recycling bins to having this task incorporated into
housekeeping duties. Each year the students host Green Week, a collection of
events and activities related to Earth Day and the environment. All campus
printers are set to print double-sided pages as part of Information Services
Print Green Initiative. Each of these efforts experienced similar troubles as
those mentioned earlier, yet persistence and creativity led to success.
The university is expanding the number of filtered water hydration stations
on campus, as an alternative to bottled water, rather than “banning the bottle.”
Student research determined that athletes were among the largest purchasers of
bottled water, as there were no hydration stations in most of the campus
athletic facilities. Hydration stations are being installed in six locations, almost
all in athletic facilities, this fall, and a student was awarded $800 to buy OWU
water bottles to promote the new hydration station to athletes.
There is also work on two related sustainable food issues. The first effort is
to revive the campus garden and develop a means for sustaining it over time.
To these ends, Environmental Studies student and Sustainability Development
intern, Emily Howald, has developed a plan to offer campus “activity courses”
(partial credit courses offered by the physical education program on campus,
typically activities like yoga, running, and conditioning) that involve
gardening. These courses will be offered in the second half of the spring
semester (planting/harvesting early crops) and first half of the fall semester
(planting/harvesting late crops) to take into account Ohio’s growing season. In
addition, students Maddie Coalmer and Larynn Cutshaw undertook a project
to document a dozen out-of-the-way locations on campus to plant perennial
crops (asparagus, mint, raspberries), which require minimal maintenance.
Second, due to increasing student interest in local foods, student Ellen
Sizer undertook a project to get more local foods on campus. She developed a
proposal for a “Hyper Local Salad Bar,” which will be supplied by the nearby
Seminary Hill organic farm, part of the Methodist Theological School of Ohio,
managed by Tad Peterson and Noel Deehr. Tad and Noel have the capacity to
provide many salad bar ingredients year round by using a greenhouse as well
as a local food network (of organic farms) that they have developed.
Finally, OWU is expanding its sustainability and environmental vision
beyond campus. During the fall of 2015 (and again during fall, 2017) we have
offered a travel learning course focused on assessing environmental change,
with a strong sustainability component, led by OWU Geography faculty
member Nathan Amador Rowley. Students and faculty in the course work with
Geoporter, a nongovernmental organization located in Bahia Ballena, Uvita,
Costa Rica. Amy Work, a 2004 OWU Geography major, manages Geoporter.
As residents of a coastal area in transition from a fishing economy to one based