About the Eco-Rep Program

Objectives

• To raise awareness of environmental issues on the UMass campus through monthly campaigns and educational displays.
• To reduce energy and resource use and the campus carbon footprint.
• To develop an environmental mentoring program for first-year students, and providing an opportunity for upper class men and women to stay involved in environmental efforts here at UMass.
• To utilize peer-to-peer interactions in hopes of increasing receptivity, and increasing environmental literacy campus-wide.

Goals

Short Term:
-Focusing on larger scale displays outside of specific dorms until we can build a quality base of Eco-Reps.
-Have one focus per semester dedicated to both reducing electricity consumption and reducing water consumption.
-Decrease the quantity of Eco-Reps in the program, while increasing the quality of student’s chosen to participate in the Program.
-Passing responsibilities, such as research, down from the Program administrators to Eco-Reps.
-Once a semester, invite a speaker from the environmental field to address the Eco-Reps, which the Eco-Reps are required to attend.
-In Fall 09, pilot the Eco-Rep program in a few upperclassmen dorms in preparation of potentially entering all residence halls in Fall 2010.

Long Term:
-Expand program to all residence halls on campus.
-Reduce energy consumption in the dorms we can isolate by 5% in the next academic year.
-Reduce water consumption in the targeted dorms by 5% in the next academic year.
-Developing a structure in which we can combine large-scale displays and more intimate floor based interactions to achieve the most effective mode of peer-to-peer environmental education.
-Form a system in which interested students can get more and more involved with the program if they are interested in doing so.

Structure

The Eco-Rep Program is structured in such a way that allows students to interact with their peers in a setting in which information, thoughts, and questions about environmental issues, and their impacts can be exchanged freely. Once a student is chosen to be an Eco-Rep, they will attend weekly hour long trainings held for each living area (or in one near by in the case of Northeast and Orchard Hill Eco-Reps). Trainings are designed by the Program Managers, Nell Finnigan and Shalini Jayarama, and the Area Eco-Reps. Area Eco-Reps are students who have previously served as Eco-Reps and have been chosen to help facilitate the Program in the area of campus in which they live. These trainings will prepare Eco-Reps for both monthly interactions with the students in both their dorm, and their living area as a whole. These interactions will be centered around a monthly focus selected especially for the Eco-Rep Program by the Program Managers, and Area Eco-Reps.

Interactions may include:

1. Setting up a table with an educational display in one of the four dining halls here on campus, or an individual dorm and being present to answer questions and expand on the monthly focus for passing students who express interest.
2. Organizing and putting on an event such as a film screening (targeted towards the monthly focus), a presentation, a speaker, or the like, that is advertised and open to all students, but located in an Eco-Reps respective living area.
3. Outdoor displays on a larger scale than possible in the dining halls that utilize attention grabbing public demonstrations such as a shock-value display.
4. Any other type of interaction created by the Eco-Reps and approved by their Area Eco-Rep and the Program Managers.

First Week

At the beginning of each month a core set of information pertaining to the monthly focus, along with more extensive articles will be distributed to all Eco-Reps before the first training. Eco-Reps are responsible for bringing with them to the meeting the reason this focus is important to them, and a solid understanding of why we as a Program have decided to take on this cause. The focus, people’s individual feelings about the issue, and why we are taking on the cause will all be discussed during this first meeting. It is the goal of this meeting to leave Eco-Reps with a solid base of knowledge pertaining that months focus.

Monthly focuses have been chosen because they both pertain to student’s daily lives directly, and will have a lasting effect on how students view their environmental impact.

Second Week

At this training it is up to Eco-Reps and Area Eco-Reps in each living area to decide how best to effectively communicate this information provided. Eco-Reps will plan an event, or organized campaign structured around the monthly focus. All details, including who is doing what, will be discussed and finalized during this meeting.

Third Week

At this training all materials for the event will be created. This process should run efficiently, since all Eco-Reps know exactly what they are responsible for creating during this time. Along with the materials that Eco-Reps create for the event or display, Eco-Reps will also be responsible for creating two educational materials to be hung or distributed in that individual’s dorms. These materials do not need to be created at the weekly meeting. Supplies will be provided at the material making training which Eco-Reps are encouraged and expected to use for their individual dorms materials, but the making of materials for the event come first at the training session. The purpose of these materials is to help the Eco-Rep reinforce the topic and specific information of the monthly focus.

Fourth Week

The last week of every month is the week in which all events will take place. The time spent at the event will count as the meeting or training session for this week.

Each semester there will also be a speaker from an environmental field that relates to one of the monthly focuses invited to come speak to the Eco-Reps as a whole. This speaker will be mandatory for all Eco-Reps to attend, but Eco-Reps are expected to invite and encourage all students to attend this event. Eco-Reps will be responsible for advertising this speaker in their respective living areas. The goal of this speaker is to provide more opportunities for environmental education outside the classroom here on campus, and inviting students to come learn with the Program.

At the end of each month, Eco-Reps will submit a report discussing what worked, and what didn’t work about the approach they took, and what they learned from students in response to the information they shared. They will also submit any presentation materials (this will mostly be in digital image form) that they prepared. These materials will be turned into that individual’s Area Eco-Reps, and Program Managers along side their report. Area Eco-Reps and Program Managers will read the report, and provide feedback based on clarity, creativity, and accuracy; they will also evaluate the effectiveness and overall effort put into the creation of that individual’s educational materials. For their involvement in the Eco-Rep Program, Eco-Reps will receive two credits from the Environmental Sciences Department.

Area Eco-Reps

The purpose of the Area Eco-Rep position is to have a structure in place that allows a dedicated student with the responsibilities listed below to be located in each living area. This group of students will have input on decisions made at the administrative level of the Program, provide more personalized responses to the Eco-Reps’ reports and educational materials, provide more oversight for interactions and educational materials in their respective living areas, and give Program Managers more support with issues pertaining issues in individual living areas. These individuals will receive 3 credits per semester.

There will be two Area Eco-Reps in the Upper Central cluster, Lower Central cluster, Orchard Hill/Northeast cluster and one Area Eco-Rep in Southwest North cluster and Southwest South cluster.

Area Eco-Reps will have the following responsibilities:

1. Meet weekly with other Area Eco-Reps and the Program Managers in which trainings will be organized, events will be reflected on, and the program as a whole will be discussed.
2. Co-facilitate and/or run weekly trainings in their living area with a Program Manager.
3. Organize Eco-Reps in their area to plan and execute large-scale educational displays.
4. Coordinate with all appropriate administrators and personnel to ensure that educational displays are possible and run smoothly.
5. Continuously keep the line of communication open between the Eco-Reps in their area and themselves, helping them with any problems or frustrations they might have throughout the semester.
6. At the beginning of each semester, the chosen people for the Area Eco-Rep positions will meet with the Program Managers one on one and draft a contract for the credits they will be receiving. The aforementioned responsibilities will already be on this contract, but there will be room to add a few more responsibilities focusing on whatever interest each individual Area Eco-Rep has in the Program. This will allow each Area Eco-Reps to work on the part of the Program that interests them the most along with fulfilling the necessary responsibilities of the position.
7. Area Eco-Reps are required to fill out self-evaluations at the end of each semester. After filling these out, Area Eco-Reps will meet with the Program Managers and/or Josh Stoffel, the Sustainability Coordinator and Eco-Rep Program Coordinator, to discuss their participation throughout the semester, and reflect on their experience.

Application Process for Area Eco-Reps:

During the Spring semester of each year, the Area Eco-Rep position will be presented to everyone involved presently in the Program. Applications, which are emailed out to all Eco-Reps, and posted on the web site, are due sometime in April (to be determined each year.) Even current Area Eco-Reps must turn in a new application. After applications have been reviewed by the Program Managers the most qualified applicants will be interviewed to aid in the selection process. Both Program Managers will attend the interviews and ask each applicant a series of predetermined questions. All interviews will take place during the span of the same week and by the following Monday all decisions will be made and announced by the Program Managers.

Application Process for Eco-Reps:

First-year students will hopefully be introduced to the Eco-Rep program at New Students Orientation. They will also be introduced to the Program when they arrive at school on the first day. Students will be reminded about the Program, and directed to the web site by their RA’s in their first floor meeting. Students will apply to be Eco-Reps in the dorms in which they reside.

Once students have applied for the Eco-Rep Program, their applications will be reviewed by both the Area Eco-Rep assigned to their living area, and a Program Manager. If both the Area Eco-Rep and the Program Manager feel that the applicant would make an effective Eco-Rep, that Eco-Rep will be asked to set up an interview with their Area Eco-Rep or one of the Program Managers. During the interview, Eco-Reps will be asked a series of questions inquiring about their creativity, interest in the environment, and dependability. The number of applicants selected to be Eco-Reps is based on how many students live in their dorms and living areas.

Students who served as Eco-Reps during the fall semester will have the option of returning to the Program without reapplying only if they received and A in the course during the Fall. If they received less than that, they will be required to reapply (using a different application) that asks them to reflect on their experience during the first semester, and explore ways in which they can improve their performance in coming semesters.

Benefits:

First Year Eco-Reps will learn about the environment, and about the skills of community-based social marketing as a way to change their own behavior as well as that of their peers. They will have the opportunity to develop a trusting and supportive relationship with their peers within the Program, deepen relationships with their peers in their living areas, and offer a meaningful service to the UMass community.

Upperclassman Eco-Reps will be able to take on a mentor role in the program, helping organize the first year Eco-Reps during events, and trainings, and continue their participation in environmental efforts here on campus.

Area Eco-Reps will have the opportunity to not only gain leadership experience, but will be given the opportunity to play an integral role in the direction that the Eco-Rep Program takes in the future. They will also gain first hand experience with the difficulties that are associated with running a Program as large in scope as the Eco-Rep Program and have the opportunity to work critically with their peers to overcome these difficulties.

The University will benefit directly from the Eco-Rep Program because students will be changing their habits to use fewer resources, which will save the University money. This will be increasingly more important as the cost of resources and utilities continue to skyrocket. By offering an outlet for a more non-traditional form of education, the Eco-Rep Program also supports the University’s goal of providing a well rounded education.

The Environment will benefit most of all from the Eco-Reps’ efforts, for they will be sharing information with all of the students in their respective living areas about the impacts that they each have on the environment and how to decrease those impacts in simple ways. The Eco-Reps will be focusing on resource conservation and how changing personal behaviors can have large positive impacts on the environment. With this approach and the personal connections that the Eco-Reps will make with the students in their living areas, even if some students don’t change their behaviors, they will at least be more aware of the impacts of their behaviors on the environment.

Timeline

Please see the program calendar.

Partnership

Since resource conservation is becoming an increasingly important issue on campus, the Eco-Rep Program is supported by a strong web of partnerships that includes the Environmental Sciences Department, Housing and Residence Life, the College of Natural Resources and the Environment, the Department of Environmental Health and Safety, the Office of Administration & Finance, the SGA Environmental Committee, the Environmental Performance Advisory Committee, the School of Education, and the Sustainability Coordinator.

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