Cal Poly needs to use some sustainability ‘strategery’

Two weeks ago thousands of students, faculty, staff and community members attended Focus the Nation: Building a Sustainable Economy. The attendance for the three-day event was impressive, but not nearly as significant as the number of people who chose to voice their opinion on what Cal Poly should do to become a more sustainable university.

On Feb. 5, 835 students (and a few faculty and staff) participated in the “What Should Cal Poly Do?” poll, each putting a thumb tack in one of five categories. The results are as follows: require a sustainability general education class (293 votes), ban plastic bags on campus (235 votes), mandate campus wide composting (166 votes), prohibit the sale of plastic water bottles (129 votes) or none of these (12 votes).

What is amazing about these numbers is that 99 percent of students who voted wanted some sort of action. Perhaps the 1 percent who voted for “none of these” believe Cal Poly should do something else besides the four available options. Maybe these voters would rather see non-invasive plant species, waterless urinals or more fair trade clothing on campus. (It’s not likely but I hope that is what they were thinking.)

To my surprise, the largest number of votes cast were for requiring a sustainability GE, which tells me that students want to learn more about sustainability. Out of all of the options, the addition of another GE would likely require the most amount of work for a student. Carrying a reusable water bottle and bag or throwing a banana peel in the compost bin instead of the adjacent trash can seems a lot easier to me than taking an additional four units of general education, but the students have spoken.

So now what do we do? We’ve got this good information that we’ll forward to campus stakeholders who will open up their e-mails today and think, “Wow, cool, these students are really headed in the right direction” and then they will hit either archive or delete.

OK, so maybe I exaggerated about how little campus stakeholders care about student opinion polls. The truth is that there are a lot of people upstairs that truly do care about sustainability and want to radically transform this campus.

Trust me, there are many of key decision makers who would love to be pressured and forced by students to implement progressive sustainability initiatives. The problem is they are not “being backed into the corner” yet.

Luckily, Cal Poly is currently at a crucial junction in deciding its future. The Cal Poly Strategic Plan 2009-2014, which defines broad-based goals and objectives to guide university decisions over the next five years, is currently open for public comment.

In this plan, seven goals are outlined, including to “Lead in Sustainability.” More specifically “Cal Poly will lead in sustainability through the educational preparation of our graduates, the research and scholarly contributions of our faculty and the practices used throughout the university.”

To accomplish this goal, five key objectives are listed. For example, the first objective is “Develop Sustainability Learning Objectives.” Does that sound strange to anyone else: the objective is to develop objectives? Now, I know strategic plans do not dive into details, but I do take issue with some of the objectives or rather lack there of. For example, nowhere is the importance of localization emphasized in this plan.

Cal Poly is a member of the San Luis Obispo community and the bounds of our responsibility for a sustainable future do not end at borders of Slack Street or U.S. Highway 1. Becoming a sustainable university will require a high level of local planning and cooperation between Cal Poly, the city and San Luis Obispo County.

Poly Canyon Village is a recent example of the need for more town cooperation. It has effectively pulled thousands of students out of the San Luis Obispo community and put them on campus in a green, energy efficient building where they don’t need to drive to campus.

Sounds good right? Well, although the atmosphere knows no difference, Cal Poly has increased its carbon footprint, while the city’s footprint has theoretically been reduced. While this may seem trivial, as greenhouse gas reduction legislation begins to be implemented in future years, issues will arise.

Additionally, as a polytechnic university with thousands of acres of land surrounding us, it should be a strategic objective to innovate and implement methods to utilize our local resources such as crops and animals. Campus Dining should be purchasing all of Cal Poly’s meats, cheeses, eggs, fruits and vegetables before buying food from the San Joaquin Valley and elsewhere around the state.

As the guiding compass for the university, the Strategic Plan presents an opportunity to start turning Cal Poly to a more sustainable future and I commend the university for making sustainability an important goal and priority in this plan. The hundreds of votes at Focus the Nation were an important signal to campus decision makers that students are ready to take the next step in sustainability, but it is hard to influence campus policy by one poll.

Changing our great university will require a continued effort from many students for many years. So log online and share your thoughts about Cal Poly’s Strategic Plan, it might just be the push that Cal Poly needs to take the next leap.

Chad Worth is an industrial engineering senior and former president of the Empower Poly Coalition. He encourages everyone to go online and comment on Cal Poly’s Strategic Plan at www.academicaffairs.calpoly.edu/StrategicPlan before March 3.