The Interfaith Sustainability Project is Earlham's chapter of the White House Interfaith Challenge. Approved by the White House, our year-long initiative brings together students, faculty, and Richmond community members on the topic of spirituality and the environment.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Preparations, Adjustments, and Recruitment

One week away from our Green Team retreat, and the Interfaith Sustainability Project is going strong! These past two weeks, we've had to prepare for the upcoming retreat, adjust to some unexpected changes, and recruit new Green Team members.

The retreat, which will be Friday, September 30 6:30PM to Saturday, October 1 4:00PM, is meant for all new Green Team volunteers. We will be spending that time together sharing meals, engaging in interfaith dialogue, having a campfire, choosing Green Teams, and more. The steering committee has been working hard to put together a packed schedule. The retreat was originally going to be an off-campus campout, however we made the decision to have it be on-campus so that more of the volunteers could come. This will be a time for us all to come together, get to know each other, and have fun!

We have, however, had to make some major adjustments recently. Kelly Burk, Director of Religious Life at Earlham and our faculty advisor, made the decision to take the rest of the semester off for medical reasons that are not life-threatening. This lead to some serious thinking about how our project will continue, and we reached the decision that it is still very possible for the Green Teams to be strong forces in the Richmond community, even without a faculty advisor. There are still a number of Earlham faculty involved in this project, including the directors of the Center for Environmental Action and the Green Science department. So the project still has all the same goals and ambitions, and we also have a number of faculty to whom we can turn when needed.

Recruitment will be going strong up until the retreat begins! Steering committee members have been visiting religious life houses and clubs as well as environmental houses and clubs. So far we have 25 Green Team members, which is past our goal of 24! However, the more volunteers the better.

Next week, updates about the retreat with pictures!

Sunday, September 11, 2011

Project Kick-Off!

Hello! Welcome to the Interfaith Sustainability Project blog. My name is Rachel Winsberg, and I will be writing to you once a week with updates about our past and upcoming events, off-campus successes, and general exciting information about the project. 


But first you may be asking, what is the Interfaith Sustainability Project? Our project began in the Spring, when Obama issued "The President's Interfaith and Community Service Campus Challenge"inviting institutions of higher education to commit to a year of interfaith and community service on- and off-campus programming. Director of Religious Life Kelly Burk and I wrote a detailed plan of action, submitted it, and got the White House's approval. We chose environmental sustainability as our theme. In addition to abiding by our “Principles and Practices,” which states that we must “work for an environmentally responsible and sustainable future,” this theme is appropriate for Earlham because of its well-established passion and momentum on campus.


Over the next two semesters, our project will be pursuing both on- and off-campus initiatives. Our on-campus events will always be co-sponsored by one of the many student or faculty religious and/or environmental groups with whom we are collaborating. Those events include, but are not limited to, highlighting environmental sustainability during religious emphasis week, film showings, religious text studies on environmental themes, speakers, and a back-campus trash pick-up/meditative walk. 


Our off-campus initiative aims to build relationships with Richmond faith communities and help them make their communities more green. We will train and equip student interfaith "Green Teams" to provide multiple free services for the faith communities. A unique service we will offer is energy audits that inform the faith communities of heat leaks in windows and doors. We will then work closely with them to help them fix those leaks in the most cost-effective way. We are currently looking for more student volunteers! Spread the word, and contact me if you're interested. You can get Bonner hours for it! 

Our goal is to offer our services to every faith community in Richmond that is interested.  However, we are especially interested in providing services to faith communities that have a high percentage of low-income families. By reaching out to low-income faith communities, we hope not only to address environmental concerns, but also to work at reducing utility costs for communities struggling to make ends meet. 

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Now that you know what we're all about, here's an update on our progress! This past Saturday, September 10, the Interfaith Sustainability Project and Earlham Environmental Action Committee co-hosted showing of Renewal at Interfaith House (Thornburg). Renewal documents faith-based environmental action all over the US. According to its website, "Renewal is the first feature-length documentary film to capture the vitality and diversity of today's religious-environmental activists. From within their Christian, Jewish, Buddhist and Muslim traditions... these women, men and children are re-examining what it means to be human and how we live on this planet." 

The showing was a great success, and afterwards we had a question-and-answer period about what it would mean to be on a Green Team. Collin Schulze, Molly McIntosh-Case, Jacob Willner, and I constitute the steering committee for this project. We fielded questions about the Green Teams, and by the end of the evening we had twelve people committed to volunteering this semester. A fantastic start! We're hoping to have at least twenty-five volunteers this semester, and the rest of the volunteers will be found through meetings with religious life groups, environmental action groups, and religious life houses. 

That's all for this evening. Thank you for your time, and spread the word to any Earlham students you think may be interested in getting involved!