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Free Sushi and Solving Climate Change with Concordia’s Sustainability Hub? Count me in!

Okay, so maybe not solving climate change, but the free food part is true!

The Concordia Sustainability Hub is an open group of rad folks who come together on a monthly basis to talk about sustainability. Regular attendees usually include SC, the SAF, the CFC, CUCCR, The Dish Project, EH&S, JSEC, and The Concordia Greenhouse, although anyone looking to learn more about sustainability or get involved is always welcome. Conversations typically focus on what groups are up to, what they could use support in, how they can offer their support to others, and even how events and activities can be collectively organized. A much anticipated and upcoming “Lunch & Learn” series set to launch this coming Fall based on the Sustainability Action Plans at the university is an example of just that.

These Lunch & Learns are community events open to all people who are interested in learning more about sustainability in the Concordia context, as well as how they can get involved in being part of the change. The first Lunch & Learn is set to take place on Thursday, September 13th from 11:00 am – 1:00 pm in the EV Junction and will tackle arguably the greatest challenge of our time: Climate Change.

Climate change, waste, food, research and curriculum, and accessibility and diversity are some pretty all-encompassing and poignant issues in the sustainability world, so we think that it’s great that Concordia is working on institutionalizing sustainability in terms of its practices, policies, and processes by creating and eventually implementing action plans based on these 5 “sustainability streams”.

These Lunch and Learns will create a space for people to learn about Concordia’s current sustainability efforts, engage in discussion with experts and change-makers on campus about what is systematically working well and what needs to change, and discover how they can get involved in cultivating an inclusive, empowering, and impactful culture of sustainability at the university. Not to mention, Rawlins Rolls (the hottest vegan sushi joint around campus) will be tickling our tastebuds on the 13th, so you really don’t want to miss this!

We can’t wait to see you there. If you have any questions about this event, or Concordia’s work on the Sustainability Action Plans, don’t hesitation to pass by our space and start a conversation.

Peace, Love, & Sustainability

Vanessa

 

 

Photo: SC’s board retreat 2018 in St Henri

Summer retreat brief with our new general coordinator

Few things are more fun than getting a group of fabulously rad folks together and talking about how you’re going to join forces to save the world! Ok, maybe not “save” and maybe not “the world”, but a girl can dream, right?

 

Every summer, Sustainable Concordia’s Coordinators and Board of Director Members get together for a weekend of hard work filled with visioning, strategic planning, campus analysis, and a ton of fun sprinkled in between. Summer 2018 was no different and our team is only just recovering from the wickedly invigorating group retreat that we had at the beginning of July.

 

We made La Ruche — the dreamiest Art Hive in Montreal — our home base for the retreat, and worked away. We looked inwards at what we need as an organization to function harmoniously given the big hairy goals that we’ve set out for ourselves, and outwards at what the community needs from us.

 

We dived deeper into the new committee structure we’ve set in place, and thought critically about Concordia University’s Action Plans (click here to learn all about Concordia’s Sustainability Policy that sparked a need for solid action plans concerning the topics of Climate Change, Food, Waste, Accessibility & Diversity, and Research & Curriculum at the university).

 

Our retreat left us feeling empowered, inspired, and excited for the year of hard work that lies ahead of us as a change-making organization on campus. We can’t wait to share all of our ideas and work with the larger community, and are eager for you all to be part of what we’re aiming to accomplish. To learn more about how you can get involved, visit our website.

 

Peace, Love, & Sustainability

Vanessa Macri

Sustainable Concordia General Coordinator

The first SIP workshop is out!!

 

Last week, as the first part of our summer retreat with our new and enthusiastic board, Alice and Jueji, members of the Sustainable Investing Project, led us through the very first workshop of the initiative. Alice, our finance coordinator and current leader of the project, explained that the goal of the workshop is to start guiding organizations through the process of choosing what to invest in, within the large realm of sustainable investments (here’s a resource developed by previous team members if you would like to know more yourself!)

 

During a couple of hour, we discussed what we valued as an organization so that the SIP team got a clearer idea of where to start their research to build our portfolio (a collection of hand-picked investments, in the form of chosen companies we think our organization should support).

Alice and Jueji first explained very clearly what sustainable investing was all about, why it mattered, and how we would create a portfolio as an organization. We then went through what we considered important sustainability issues, and then proceeded to prioritizing them (which was very challenging for us!). Finally, we established a list of criterias companies we would invest in should conform to, that align with the priorities we chose.

 

The workshop sparked amazing discussions, and got the team very excited and committed to the research. The session aimed to give us more vocabulary and ease with investment concepts. It also enabled us to start conversations in and out of the organization, while giving our researchers a clearer scope to build our portfolio.

Hopefully the SIP team got enough feedback from us and is now ready to look into our options! SC will lead it by example, and Alice is hoping other organizations will collaborate and join the research, enabling the community to slowly create a significant fund.

 

SIP is starting to get a lot of attention, we are glad there is strong interest in that project in the community, and some momentum around sustainable investing practices in Montreal!

More and more non-finance people are starting to get their hands on investing, just like Alice did – with an accounting background, she explained she is continuously learning through SIP and getting familiar with those concepts, as she wants herself to eventually be able to know what to invest in.  

 

‘If you have money, you have power. Investment touches everyone,’ she finally pointed out. So get in there, reach out, and make your money count!  Join the movement and get involved now!

 

Noah Baum and Dario D’Onofrio’s (great) podcast on divestment at ConU

Maybe you heard the news: Sustainable Concordia wants to start a podcast really soon! 2018 will be the year of audio exploration –  We’ll have interviews, updates, found footage, event coverage, maybe even office drama.
We hope you are as excited as we are!

Two students, Noah Baum and Dario D’Onofrio, decided to talk divestment for one of their classes and interviewed Emily, our External and Campaigns Coordinator. Their podcast is officially the first audio piece featured on our website, inspiring us to soon kick off this whole new project! Thank you Dario and Noah for these precious and captivating 8 minutes!

Check their work right below ~ and stay tuned for SC’s own content!