With climate change threatening an increasingly rocky future, the Student Government Association created a Student Sustainability Committee.

The new group will be dedicated to helping push PNW in more sustainable directions. In the coming weeks, SGA will establish in more detail what the committee’s role on campus will be.

Joshua Buggs, SGA president pro tempore and a representative for the College of Engineering and Science, led the charge in establishing this new committee. 

“There’s been a great deal of student interest in environment and sustainability,” he said. “So, it’s my job as their voice to push forward initiatives related to such to upper administration.”

Environmental awareness has been common at PNW. Initiatives have included the residence halls’ recycling program, student participation in a recent Climate Leadership Summit, and the placement of bee hives on PNW’s campuses. 

But Sustainability Committee members believe there’s more to be done, and a need to pull some of these disjointed efforts together into a group with a coherent voice.

“Since I’ve arrived here I’ve seen it – sustainability – in a lot of places on campus … so it would be great if we could just organize and formalize,” said Rachel Krcmerich, a campus Planning administrator who has been working with the Sustainability Committee.

The committee aims to harness student interest in sustainability into action. Currently, it is developing ideas for projects such as creating a PNW sustainability plan, lowering campus carbon emissions, getting students involved with local organizations, and spreading awareness. 

“The end goal I would like to see can be summed up with two words: effortless sustainability,” said SGA’s Buggs. “I want people to be well-educated enough and I want to have the infrastructure in place so that sustainable choices become second nature.”