Collaborations for Sustainability

Collaboration across campus, universities, and the region is a critical part of Western’s sustainability goals and SEI’s approach to addressing the many, complex sustainability topics Western faces. SEI participates in coalitions on and off of campus and convenes working groups focused on moving sustainability work forward.

WWU sustainability working groups: SEI participates in and convenes working groups that focus on specific sustainability topics impacting campus, like sustainable purchasing, waste management, and food security. The working groups aim to coordinate efforts across campus to address pressing sustainability-related issues.  

The Wellbeing Collaborative is a group of students, staff, and faculty who seek to chart a path forward for Western as a health promoting institution. In 2022, the Wellbeing Collaborative adopted four pillars to organize around: accessibility, diversity, equity, and inclusion, culture of health and wellbeing, The built environment, and sustainability. Through collaborative strategizing and implementation, the Wellbeing Collaborative supports Western’s commitment to move toward more systems-level strategies that influence the health and wellbeing of every member of the Western community. 

The President's Sustainability Council is the body charged with expressing, upholding, and advancing the institution’s commitment to sustainability, resilience, and adaptability. One SEI employee is appointed by the Provost. Learn more about the council.  

The SEI co-convenes this coalition as a space to regularly gather students who are leading and innovating to advance environmental sustainability at Western (club leaders, highly engaged students, and student employees). The coalition is in its first year, so is still refining priorities and governing documents. More soon.  

The Whatcom County Climate Coordination Committee (WC4) is a coalition of local government agencies and higher education institutions that are working on climate change mitigation and resilience work in Whatcom County. WC4 aims to collaborate on projects and coordinate efforts across institutions. 

The Washington Higher Education Sustainability Coalition is a network of faculty and staff from colleges and universities in our state. WAHESC provides monthly conference calls to build connections between institutions and support a growing community within higher education working on sustainability programs. WAHESC is an affiliate of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE).  

Western is home to the Curriculum for the Bioregion program, which works with college and university faculty, leaders, and experts throughout Washington, Oregon, and Northern California to build sustainability concepts and place-based learning into a wide array of undergraduate courses. Since the program was initiated in 2005, Curriculum for the Bioregion has worked with over 50 higher education institutions.  

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Any WWU student, staff, or faculty member is eligible to apply for a grant to fund a campus-based project that positively impacts sustainability on our campus and in our communities. The SEJF program is housed within SEI, with dedicated staff members helping prospective applicants learn grant writing skills and navigate the application process. SEJF project teams collaborate with stakeholders both across all sectors within WWU, as well as with local organizations and companies. The allocation of grant funds is the responsibility of the SEJF Committee, which reviews and approves all grant proposals. The committee is co-chaired by the SEJF Program Manager (an SEI representative) and the AS Vice President for Sustainability. The SEI Associate Director, as well as the SEJF Student Ambassador, also serve as non-voting members on the committee. The SEJF Committee has student representatives from multiple areas of study, as well as two staff and faculty representatives. The SEJF program as a whole is meant to support intersectional, cross-collaborative efforts, aimed at working together to improve sustainability at WWU.