The Office of Sustainability has awarded grants totaling $20,000 to six students as part of its second annual Campus Sustainability Grants Program. The money, which comes from the student-paid green fee, will fund projects aimed at advancing campus sustainability.
Twenty-one grant proposals were submitted in December and evaluated by a selection committee of students, faculty and staff. Grant recipients for 2012 are:
• Brandi Bishop, a senior agricultural education major at the Tifton Campus, will develop a recycling program there. She plans to install 60 waste reduction stations in 15 of the busiest buildings.
• Katie Shepard, a master’s student in crop and soil sciences, will monitor the effectiveness of an East Campus rain garden at filtering pollutants from storm water runoff.
• Chris McDowell, a master’s student in the College of Environment and Design, will demonstrate how construction and demolition waste products can be diverted from the landfill and converted into tangible community-based improvements.
• JoHannah Biang, a master’s student in horticulture, will construct a living wall planted with seasonal herbs and vegetables to research and demonstrate the effectiveness of vertical gardening. The wall will be installed at UGArden, the university’s campus community garden and will be maintained by student volunteers.
• Graham Pickren, a doctoral student in geography, is expanding a program that collects, donates and recycles unwanted items from student residence halls during move-out week. Pickren will be working with Dawgs Ditch the Dumpster Move-Out Donation Program to implement an electronic waste collection to go along with the clothing and furniture donation program.
• Zach Richardson, a senior landscape architecture student, will create a prescribed grazing program, using goats, to remove exotic invasive plants and restore native forest adjacent to Tanyard Creek.
“The program provides students with valuable experience in grant-writing and an opportunity for hands-on implementation of sustainable practices,” said Kevin Kirsche, director of the Office of Sustainability. “We enjoy working with them to take their ideas from concept to completion.”
