Green chemistry, climate education and water efficiency are among the faculty and student projects that have been awarded a new grant to promote sustainability. The Meyer Fund for a Sustainable Environment awarded $200,000 to be divided among five projects at the University of Oregon and Lane Community College.
Related Links
Some projects are collaborations among students, faculty and staff, and some involve different departments and the two colleges. The grant will award a total of $1 million to new projects for the next five years. Organizers hope the projects eventually spread to other colleges across the country or act as models for other campuses.
The steering committee that awarded the money received 31 applications, said University Sustainability Director Steve Mital. From there, the committee asked those involved with eight projects to create more detailed proposals.
Chemistry professor Jim Hutchison, head of the steering committee, called the projects “exciting.”
“This is a really exciting group of projects,” Hutchison said. “We have projects relating from microfinance in Uganda, to water resources, to green chemistry. It illustrates the diversity of sustainability projects that are spinning up on campus and at Lane.”
Meyer Fund For A Sustainable Environment
| Who provided the money: | T&J Meyer Family Foundation. Tim Meyer, a native of Oregon, helped expand a Salem-based potato chip maker into England in the 1980s. |
| What it does: | Provides seed funding for campus groups wanting to implement new sustainability practices. |
| How much: | $200,000 will be awarded annually for the next five years. |
Hutchison said it makes sense to collaborate with LCC because the University and LCC have different strengths.
“UO is a research institution, and Lane Community College has a significant public service and public outreach component,” Hutchison said. “We need to have great synergy between the two.”
The grant money provides seed funding to help jump-start projects, but each project must find additional funding later on. Those who were awarded the grant said the money gives their project a chance to become bigger and better in the future.
Students involved in the International Business and Economics Club plan on creating a microfinance organization to research and fund sustainable projects in Uganda. Microfinancing provides small loans to those in developing countries to start a business or service, said business instructor Ron Severson, who is involved in IBEC.
The group, for example, wants to help provide loans to Ugandans who dispense low-carbon emission cook stoves, Severson said. Most in Uganda currently cook on open fires. Cooking on stoves could reduce carbon emissions by 50 to 70 percent, according to the group’s application.
Although the grant is seed money, it will provide credibility to the organization, Severson said.
“It won’t supply the loans themselves, but in a way, that makes sense. The grant will enable us to attract donors,” Severson said. “I don’t think we could really attract those loans without the legitimacy this grant gives us.”
Severson said students are the driving force of the project.
“What distinguishes this microfinance organization from others is that it’s really a learning organization,” Severson said. “It’s really set up to engage students in real research projects.”
Students helped co-write the grant proposal, said University student Peter Dixon.
Students are attending a microfinance conference this weekend and will explore Uganda this summer to get to know the culture, Dixon said.
“There are things we just can’t learn in a classroom,” he said.
Other winning projects focused on curriculum.
The University’s Materials Science Institute, which is developing new graduate curriculum for sustainable materials, won grant money to help test some teaching concepts at a summer workshop.
“It’ll basically be a trial run to see how it works,” said chemistry professor David Tyler. “We get to try it out before we do anything with it.”
The group plans on eventually asking the National Science Foundation for money when the curriculum is further developed.
“Then we can say, ‘Hey look, we’ve tried it out with some support from the Meyer Family Foundation.’ We can say, ‘This is what worked, this is what didn’t, and this is what we did to fine-tune it,’” Tyler said.
The grant will continue next year, and organizers expect another batch of proposals with new ideas.
“We think these five projects as an initial group will establish this as an important catalyst for sustainability,” said Sarah Ulerick, an administrator in the science department of LCC and member of the steering committee.
Those interested in applying next year must have a faculty adviser. Students can also apply to the Energy Conservation and Alternative Futures Fund, Mital said. That grant awards $40,000 annually to students.
[email protected]
