Yahara CLEAN Compact members promote a culture of sustainability in recognition of how our natural environment contributes to the region’s economic vitality, recreational offerings, and local quality of life.
Community Engagement
Resilience Spotlight: Health practitioners, educators and students declare climate change a public health emergency, unite to decarbonize health care
Health professionals on campus and from across the state of Wisconsin are battling the pandemic while taking action in recognition that the global climate crisis is another public health emergency – an emergency with no vaccine.
Resilience Spotlight: Creating climate-ready communities in Wisconsin
University and community experts are coming together to make Madison a climate-ready community.
Office of Sustainability interns launch new podcast
In the face of COVID-19 and the shift to remote work during the summer session, Office of Sustainability (OS) interns had to get creative about engaging the campus community. With Smart Restart approaching in …
Office of Sustainability student interns partner with Texas Woman’s University team to achieve Zero Waste
Interns Catie McDonald and Riley Collins collaborated with students, staff, and faculty at Texas Woman’s University to help make the 2020 Sci-Southwest Regional Symposium a zero-waste event, which means 90% or more waste was diverted …
Student Intern Column: Community Gardens Offer Benefits But Face Challenges
Ally Magnin is a rising senior studying Environmental Sciences with a certificate in Sustainability. She is a member of the Green Events team, where she works to provide resources to make events across campus more …
Sharing Sustainability Achievements and Insights at the 2018 AASHE Conference
In October, staff and students from the Office of Sustainability joined University Housing sustainability coordinator Breana Nehls and a large contingent from sustainability programs at several UW System schools to attend the 2018 Association for …
Top-Down versus Bottom-Up: Two Approaches to Sustainability
This guest article was written by Jason Gallup, former Student Programs Director at the Office of Sustainability. The window for avoiding the catastrophic effects of environmental degradation is small. As a society, we are now …
Several Hundred People, 11 Pounds of Trash: A Successful Zero Waste Pilot on Earth Day
“Zero waste”—it’s an idea that can feel slightly naïve in our consumerist culture. Nearly everything we do produces waste of some kind. And when large groups of people gather for an all-day event—say, hundreds of …
Great World Texts Program Revisits “Silent Spring” and the Legacy of Rachel Carson
On a Monday in early April, hundreds of high school students from across the state of Wisconsin woke up early and took buses to Union South for an entire day of discussion about Rachel Carson’s …