Craig Chamberlain, a Social Sciences Editor for Illinois News Bureau, released an article highlighting the lack of coverage dedicated to bees in mainstream news. Supporting his article with a study from researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, it was found that the amount of attention dedicated to "pollinator population topics" has significantly declined over several decades.

Read Chamberlain's article through Illinois News Bureau or the PDF in the attached files!

The SSC approved $12,000 in funding for a precious plastic campus recycling hub in Fall 2020. This project expires 12/16/2022.

On December 10, the Engagement SWATeam met to discuss progress within each of its subteams:

1. Sustainability education and training requirements for new students and faculty

2. Creating a roadmap of sustainability infrastructure at UIUC and researching initiatives of other universities which have been successful in sustainability engagement

3. Creating and implementing a GivePulse channel for iSEE under the UIUC account

4. Promoting the Green Events program at the Illini Union

Meeting minutes are attached below.

Instructors Get Course Development Funding to Incorporate Sustainability

The 2021 Levenick Teaching Sustainability Fellowship offers funding for U of I instructors to integrate sustainability components into an existing course ($1,000) or develop a new course with a sustainability focus ($2,000). To maximize student reach, iSEE especially encourages applications from instructors of 100- and 200-level courses. Read more and apply at go.illinois.edu/LevTeachingFellows

Tony Mancuso • Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment (iSEE)

The Engagement SWATeam members met on November 20 with Eric Green (Education SWATeam) to discuss first-year sustainability education recommendations. Topics discussed included working recommendations for a sustainability module in college 100-level courses, a mandatory sustainability training, and a sustainability general education requirement, all of which are currently being investigated by the Education SWATeam. Additionally, discussion of successful sustainability engagement principles led to a forming of two sub-teams to work towards recommendations within our committee:

1) Led by co-chair Ann Witmer: Creating a roadmap of current sustainability-focused projects that are going on and connections we can utilize to make future recommendations more effective 

2) Led by co-chair Robert McKim: Creating a sustainability 100 for individual colleges or one-size fits all model 

Meeting minutes are also attached below.

The following email was sent on November 16, 2020 to the RLF Selection Committee:

Revolving Loan Fund Selection Committee,

I want to thank everybody again for your participation in the previous selection process. With the completion of that vote, the RLF fund source still has approximately $300,000+ available and a time sensitive submission from DIA has been received recently. The project being submitted is for a Retro-Commissioning (RCx) effort at the State Farm Center. RCx efforts see great results under normal operating conditions, but with the pandemic, significant savings could be realized now that many events are being cancelled and the facility is not being utilized at its full capacity. The request is for $250K and could see a payback of less than 2 years. Please see the attached document for more information.

We don’t necessarily need to score this project, all we need is a majority decision (yes or no) to approve.

I ask that you please reply with your individual yes (in support of funding) or no (decline funding approval) votes before November 26, 2020 (10 days away).

... Thank you again for your continued support of the RLF program.

See the attached file to read details about the Retro-Commissioning (RCx) for the State Farm Center.

The attached proposal is for funding from the Revolving Loan Fund to do RCx at the State Farm Center. This project is expected to cost $250,000 and pay for itself in energy savings within two years of completion.