Spring 2007, Volume 10 Newsletter:
Campus Sustainability Competition Engages Entire Harvard Community
In one of its broadest outreach efforts to date, the Harvard Green Campus Initiative is sponsoring “A Vision of Sustainability,” a new art and design competition that asks every member of the campus community to think about how the Sustainability Principles adopted last year by President Lawrence H. Summers can be implemented. In addition to students, staff, and faculty in all areas of the University, the competition is open to alumni and the spouses, domestic partners and children of students and employees.
“In response to the global environmental imperative, Harvard University has stepped forward to implement a set of Campus-wide Sustainability Principles that commit Harvard to becoming a model of sustainable institutional practice. To help us develop, expand and energize an emerging vision of what campus sustainability could mean for us, we need to tap the intellect, talent, imagination and interest of the entire Harvard community. The time couldn’t be better to ask the people in our community to come forward with their ideas.” said Leith Sharp, director of the Harvard Green Campus Initiative.
Reaching Across Harvard
To publicize the competition and its $10,000 in cash prizes, generously donated by Environmental Health and Engineering Inc, the HGCI is using tried and true outreach methods as well as a whole new palette of approaches. As in the past, HGCI staff members are working with colleagues and students throughout the University to spread word of the initiative. But because the population eligible to participate in the Vision of Sustainability competition is broader than in previous campaigns of a similar nature, the HGCI has had to reach out to more departments around campus, creating new connections and discovering new supporters of campus-greening activities. In particular, staff discovered ways to reach out to Harvard’s families through Harvard’s childcare centers, the Harvard Neighbors program, Harvard’s Students, Spouses & Partners Association, the Harvard International Office and the Cambridge Public School system.
“We wanted to involve the entire community in thinking about what a sustainable Harvard campus of the near future might look like and that meant thinking in new ways about who our audience was and how we could reach them,” said Competition Coordinator Alayne Moody. “We wanted everyone who has a relationship with the campus - from the professors in the academic departments to the preschoolers in the campus childcare centers - to know about this opportunity to win prizes and have a say in what a sustainable Harvard would look like. We wanted ideas from every generation, every discipline, every profession and every background. Because the challenge of becoming a model of sustainability will ultimately affect and depend upon everyone, we believe that every vision counts. With this in mind, we are looking at the Harvard community in the broadest possible way, and we are learning so much about our community in the process of trying to reach out to all the different people in it.”
Prizes
The Vision of Sustainability competition has adult and junior categories, with the top adult prize being $2000 and the top junior prize being $1000.
Contestants are being asked to consider Harvard’s existing campuses in Boston and Cambridge, as well as the new campus being developed in Allston, and to envision ways to build or renovate these areas so that economic, environmental and community interests are in balance, or more specifically, so that the campus in line with the University’s new Sustainability Principles.
Judging the Winners
The Vision of Sustainability Art and Design Competition began in August and will conclude with the extended entry deadline of Monday, April 3rd, 2006. The Harvard Green Campus Initiative and a number of selected members of the Harvard community will determine the top entries to be entered into the final round judging event. The final judging event will involve high-level administrators such as Sally Zeckhauser, Vice President for Administration, faculty members and student leaders from across the university in a single large judging and prize giving event during our Spring 2006 Harvard Sustaianbility Conference (see page 2.) During this final judging event, all finalists will be exhibited. As part of the judging process, a panel event will occur allowing a number of the judges to converse with each other, the artists and audience members about the ideas presented in the works of art. At the end of this event, the judges will announce the winners of the top prizes.
Campus Exhibitions
The 28 prize-winning entries in the Vision of Sustainability competition will then be turned into an exhibit that will tour Harvard’s Schools and Departments in the months leading up to the Campus Sustainability Conference in April. Exhibition viewers will have the opportunity to select the one piece most representative of their own vision of a sustainable campus, and the result of this community-wide vote will be revealed at the conference. The $500 People’s Choice award will be awarded to the artist whose piece garnered the most votes. If you would like to have the exhibition brought to your building, please contact us.
For more information about the Vision of Sustainability 2020 Art and Design Competition, please visit http://www.greencampus.harvard.edu/vision2020/