Student engagement plays a critical role in Yale’s efforts to advance sustainability on campus—and this past fall, the Office of Sustainability’s undergraduate peer educators notched some notable accomplishments.
Now in its second year, the Sustainability Peer Education Program works to educate, engage, and inspire Yale College students to participate in sustainable action through collaboration, community building, and strategic programming. The program builds on Yale’s long tradition of undergraduate student work in sustainability and aims to seamlessly integrate sustainability into student life and to build a culture of cultivated hope, empowerment, and action regarding the environment.
Fall highlights
In the course of the fall semester, our 14 sustainability peer educators:
- planned and executed 5 community-focused programs, 3 Sustainabili-tea events, 3 tabling sessions, and 2 upcycling workshops. Through these efforts, they engaged 230+ students through in-person events;
- green-certified 14 undergraduate student organizations through our student green-certification program, engaging groups that represent 900 students
- analyzed waste diversion rates at the colleges by conducting 3 waste audits at Timothy Dwight, Silliman, and Jonathan Edwards;
- doubled the program’s social media following
Spring priorities
Over the spring semester, peer educators will be working on exciting new projects to create further opportunities for growth, learning, and impact:
- Partnership with Yale Hospitality on food waste reduction initiative. Two of our peer educators—Aria Wang (Franklin ‘27) and Bruno Ong (Trumbull ‘27)—have launched a project to analyze weekly data provided by Yale Hospitality to identify critical information regarding consumption and waste in dining halls.
- Partnership with Yale College Council to green certify student organizations. Three peer educators—Krisha Ramani (Stiles ‘27), Yasmina Traore (JE ‘27), and Amalia Tuchmann (Pierson ‘27)—successfully advocated for the inclusion of sustainability as a key component of the Council’s funding guidelines, which has led to an exponential increase in student group certification this year.
- Collaboration with colleagues from Timothy Dwight and Ezra Stiles on the development of a buttery certification program. David Woods (TD ‘26) and Isabel Matos (Stiles ‘28) are partnering with staff at their residential colleges to better understand ways in which sustainability could be incorporated into buttery operations, and they are also in the process of developing a certification program.
“What I find particularly impactful about the program is its approach to sustainability. Programming and outreach is curated to be relevant to Yale College students, securing a wide reach across colleges and a high level of engagement,” says Mia Ambroiggio, who is enrolled at Yale School of the Environment and serves as a graduate student coordinator for the Sustainability Peer Education Program. “Whether through mending workshops or casual chats about sustainability topics with peers, the program’s ability to make sustainability approachable, relevant, and interesting to Yale college students is its secret weapon!”
Yale Divinity School student Jackson Ringley, who also serves as a graduate student coordinator for the program, adds: “The students in this program deeply value connection. They are adept at relationship building and understand that the work of sustainability cannot take place in isolation. I admire how our students remain committed to the difficult work of community building as they dream of a more sustainable future. I am certain they will grow into leaders who bring relationship, empathy, and care into every conversation.”
Keep up with the Sustainability Peer Education Program on Instagram at @yalecollegesustainability.