Vinati Konda, a George Mason College freshman finding out business management, hopes {that a} new stitching machine will assist her scholar group, Be The Change, restore and repurpose clothes. Be the Change not too long ago obtained $3,000 in seed cash from the Lynn Alexis Lee Corey Prize for Social Entrepreneurship to gather clothes donations for a neighborhood shelter and discover different methods to make sure used clothes doesn’t go to waste.
“We will likely be utilizing a few of our cash to offer coaching for our group in stitching and find out how to correctly put together and upcycle clothes, and we’re occupied with shopping for a stitching machine,” stated Konda, vice chairman of Be the Change. “It’s been cool to see how many individuals each on campus and within the Fairfax group are concerned with serving to out.”
Be the Change is among the outcomes of George Mason College internet hosting the 17 Rooms-U Summit final fall. The summit and conversations main as much as it introduced collectively school, employees, college students, group members, stakeholders and exterior companions to debate sustainability targets. Every “room” represented one of many 17 sustainable improvement targets recognized by the United Nations as international matters that must be addressed. Subjects included meals insecurity, gender equality and accountable consumption, to call a couple of.
Sponsored by the Institute for a Sustainable Earth (ISE) and the Business for a Better World Center, the 17 Rooms-U produced dozens of concepts, a few of which had been mixed throughout follow-up conversations. Teams championing these concepts at the moment are receiving as much as $5,000 in seed cash to implement their sustainability plans. ISE and the Enterprise for a Higher World Heart each supplied the funding for these awards, stated Leah Nichols, ISE govt director. A listing of teams receiving seed cash might be discovered here.
“The funds are supposed to assist these groups in getting issues off the bottom and rising their efforts,” stated Nichols.
Lisa Gring-Pemble, affiliate professor in Mason’s School of Business and co-executive director of the Enterprise for a Higher World Heart, stated becoming a member of one of many teams is a chance for college kids to have interaction in hands-on studying.
“By these initiatives, college students can see themselves as able to making actual change,” Gring-Pemble stated.
Amy Fowler, assistant professor within the College of Science, helped type the WATER Consortium at Mason, a gaggle devoted to bringing collectively school, employees, college students and group members concerned with points associated to underwater life. The group obtained $5,000 to cowl the prices related with creating an internet site, holding a water symposium within the fall and internet hosting a speaker sequence on the Potomac Science Center this summer time.
“There are many folks at Mason that work on points associated to water, however they’re disjointed from each other,” Fowler stated. “If we deliver folks collectively, hopefully it should construct collaborations and initiatives that may have a concentrate on sustainability.”
No Extra Starvation on our Campuses, one other initiative shaped because of the summit, focuses on outreach to college students with meals insecurity and advocating on their behalf. Within the hopes of recruiting extra college students to hitch the group, Dann Sklarew, a College of Science professor, not too long ago invited Virginia Delegates Danica Roem and Dan Helmer to talk to his college students and different company about legislative efforts to handle scholar starvation. Each affirmed bipartisan assist for ending power starvation throughout all of Virginia’s 40 group faculties and public universities.
“I would like college students to know they’ll play an essential function in serving to struggle starvation,” Sklarew stated.
Gring-Pemble says she anticipates revisiting the 17 Rooms-U Summit each two years as a signature Mason occasion to deliver new voices into current initiatives and get concepts for brand spanking new initiatives.
“These sustainability targets and initiatives, as a part of the 17 Rooms-U initiative, have the potential to outline Mason,” stated Gring-Pemble. “What a superb technique to have interaction your entire Mason group and the area across the international issues that we face.”
https://www.gmu.edu/information/2022-04/seed-funding-promotes-mason-sustainability-projects