Dr. Jennifer Hirsch serves as the Director for the Center for Serve-Learn-Sustain. She is an applied cultural anthropologist specializing in community sustainability, cultural diversity, experiential education, and network building.
Since Serve-Learn-Sustain officially opened its doors last January, we have been working closely with faculty, staff, students, and partners to define together what it means to “create sustainable communities” and to collaboratively develop programs that will nurture interdisciplinary learning, teaching, and action. One approach we have come up with is to work with different colleges, schools, and programs across campus to develop tailored strategies for SLS engagement that simultaneously promote SLS and the specific unit’s goals and objectives. For this academic year, we have launched this strategies program by partnering with nine units. Next year, we will expand the program to more.
This program is resulting in a diverse array of curricular and co-curricular offerings, all aimed at engaging students, faculty, and staff in “creating sustainable communities,” that SLS could never have come up with on our own. To give you a sense of the range, here are some examples of funded courses and activities:
Sustainability Design Jam, run by students taking a course in the Global Development Minor
21st Century Urban Housing Symposium, run by the College of Design
New sustainable development study abroad programs in Germany and Japan
Activities run by Biomedical Engineering student organizations related to health and sustainable communities
Survey of College of Sciences faculty and report suggesting potential links to community partners
Mechanical Engineering course and capstone design projects related to two SLS themes: Food, Energy Water Systems and Social Sustainability
College of Computing speaker series on computing and sustainable communities
Click on the links below to read overviews of each strategy, and contact the faculty members listed to learn more.
AY2016-17 SLS College/School/Program Strategies
· Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts
· Scheller College of Business
· GWW School of Mechanical Engineering
· Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering
· School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
· H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial & Systems Engineering (check back Spring Semester)