This is a long post so here's a table of contents(!)
1-Can anyone help organize the flying debate?
2-National Tree Week events
3-Anyone want to contribute to Will’s conservation website?
4-The
5-A few more ideas related to our strategy for a college environmental policy
6-info emails are all going to be on the blog as well
First off, we talked a little while ago about organizing a debate about academic-related flights (for fieldwork, conferences, meetings, etc.) Hanno said he would be interested in helping organize this – is there anyone else who can help him?
And if there’s enough interest in this event, let’s pick a date! It would be cool to do it before Christmas I think.
Second, National Tree Week is this coming week – there’s an events listing here: http://www.treecouncil.org.uk/?q=node/43
Unfortunately there don’t appear to be any events in Berkshire or Surrey, and the
Date: Saturday 29 November, 11am-5pm
Organiser: Islington Council
Borough: Islington
Location: Highbury Fields, Top Field, Highbury Corner, N1
Event details: As part of National Tree Week, Islington Council has organised an event to celebrate trees in Islington. The event, "Love Your Trees" will take place on Saturday 29 November from 11am to 5pm. There will be various activities including: Aerial adventure in the trees; Tree sculpture unveiling; Tree listening; Tree walks; Tree dressing; Lighting of trees in time for Christmas; Stalls and information about trees; Tree giveaway; Paper making, plus lots more including refreshments and competitions. The event is free of charge and open to people and children of all ages. There will be BSL interpreters available on the day. We will do our best to meet the specific access needs of people. They are urged to contact Greenspace on 020 7527 3288 or greenspace@islington.gov.uk
Contact: Greenspace, Islington Council, Jake Tibbetts 020 7527 3288 greenspace@islington.gov.uk Text GREENSPACE plus your message to 80800
also, there’s this tree planting day with Trees for Cities coming up, not during tree week but still sounds fun!
Woodland Christmas Fun Day
Date: Saturday, December 13th 2008 from 11:00 – 15:00
Location:
Come and celebrate a Christmas-carnival fun day, while helping to plant native trees and shrubs within
At the last meeting Will talked about a website that he runs with articles and news related to conservation . . . and that he’s looking for contributors, either for one-off articles or regular columns/editorials. If you’re interested in contributing, get in touch with him!
And for those of you who couldn’t make it to the Q&A session with the rector on Tuesday, an update on that –
We decided at Monday’s meeting to focus on Imperial’s environmental policy (or lack thereof), trying not to sound too aggressive but still drawing attention to Imperial’s poor standing in UK university green rankings.
So as the first question in the session, I said something like:
“We know that Imperial has been taking steps towards increased environmental sustainability, but the college is still among the lowest in green rankings of
The rector’s answer was promising in that energy efficiency/technology seems to be a college interest, but still not completely satisfactory. He started off by saying that he thought the league tables were unfair because as a science school, Imperial will have higher energy consumption than schools with big humanities departments (which I think is valid in itself, but not enough of an excuse as the leagure ranking is largely about other measures, including environmental policy). He said that the old rector, Sir Richard Sykes, commissioned Prof. David Gann to develop a report about (I think) changing environmental attitudes and the college Carbon footprint – this report should be presented to college management and published on the web by December or so. He also said that he’s been discussing with Jen Morgan, the student union pres, how to build enthusiasm for environmental sustainability, and discussed one of the new buildings in SK, which is full of new energy technology (ground pump heat exchange, experimental 3rd & 4th generation PV cells on roof, novel building heat/energy management technology). Then he made two promises: that all new buildings would be examples of green building, and that he will use David Gann’s report to think about how to reduce the college’s Carbon footprint.
I’m going to email him now to follow up and try and get more information.
There were also a few more ideas for the environmental policy strategy that came up in Monday’s meeting –
-using nationwide award schemes (environmental versions of schemes like Investment in People) to motivate the college
-suggesting that staff contracts include a clause (modeled on similar clauses regarding the college’s Health and Safety and ethical policies) that staff will uphold the college’s environmental policy
And finally, I’m going to start posting club-wide info emails directly to the blog, so you can go straight to the blog to find this sort of info and news instead of having to save all the emails.
whoof. thanks for reading – see you soon,
Yael
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