University of Wisconsin–Madison
Rising tides, solarpunk cities, ghosts that haunt us. This year’s winners of the Sustainability Writing Awards looked beyond the now to imagine what the places we love might look like in a world shaped by unchecked climate catastrophe. The winning essays, all written by students at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, explore the tension between hope …
This story, by Devin Guthrie, is one of three winners of the 2025 Sustainability Writing Awards hosted by the Office of Sustainability. You can read more about Devin here. Octavia removed the last piece of Estelle from her hair, placing it into the bag upon her shoulders. Her overgrown braids finally laid bare after eight years of …
This story, by Ross O’Donnell, is one of three winners of the 2025 Sustainability Writing Awards hosted by the Office of Sustainability. You can read more about Ross here. The city barely looks like a city from overhead. The generations who first paved its overgrown streets and erected its shored-up high-rises would struggle to recognize their old …
This story, by Lily Smogor, is one of three winners of the 2025 Sustainability Writing Awards hosted by the Office of Sustainability. You can read more about Lily here. Josey knew it was over three weeks before the government did. She’d woken to birdsong, a cardinal perched on her windowsill opposite the fraying screen, its flat black-marble …
This essay, by Lily Smogor, is one of three winners of the 2024 Sustainability Writing Awards hosted by the Office of Sustainability. You can read more about Lily here. The twin mesas rise together at the end of the road. They wear a skirt of juniper and yucca, the pinkish-orange rock peeking through only slightly until the …
This essay, by Maisha Islam, is one of three winners of the 2024 Sustainability Writing Awards hosted by the Office of Sustainability. You can read more about Maisha here. The summer of 2022 completely changed how I thought about environmental challenges. I found myself caught between two worlds: the bustling, chaotic cities and the quiet, serene villages …
This essay, by Veronica Goveas, is one of three winners of the 2024 Sustainability Writing Awards hosted by the Office of Sustainability. You can read more about Veronica here. I grew up in a village in Wisconsin, where summer heat was mild and fleeting. We measured storms by the inches they left on the sidewalk, not by …
The White Mesa Uranium Mill leaching radioactive waste near the Bears Ears National Monument in Utah. The bustling streets of Bangladesh and the quaint, rural villages on the outskirts both deluged with pollution. A health clinic in Milwaukee inundated with patients whose conditions are exacerbated by the intense heat of climate change. These are the …
This essay, by Scott Hershberger, is one of three winners of the 2023 Sustainability Writing Awards hosted by the Office of Sustainability. You can read more about Scott here. Due to its innovative formatting, we have uploaded this essay in PDF format below. Read Scott’s essay in PDF format.
This essay, by Hailey Sewell, is one of three winners of the 2023 Sustainability Writing Awards hosted by the Office of Sustainability. You can read more about Hailey here. During the winter of 2007-8, there was a total snowfall of more than 100 inches in the city of Madison. The biggest storm occurred just before the turn …