Sustainability Week: a recap
‘How do we support people to be more sustainable?’ was a question I heard raised many times over the past week. That’s because it was the University’s inaugural Sustainability Week, a week full of activities from panel discussions, keynote speakers, and workshops to hands-on practical activities such as tree planting, bird walk, and ‘meet our conservation cows’. The intention was not only to amplify the many and varied sustainability activities underway in the University, but to initiate and continue conversations about what more we can do – as an institution and with our collaborators.
As you might expect, StACCS was involved in organising, hosting, and contributing to a range of initiatives during the week. Working with professional services staff, students, researchers in other Schools across the University, and a range of representatives beyond the University, activities organised by StACCS collaborators included:
- On Sunday 27th October, Drs Katy Roucoux, Ian Lawson and George Biddulph ran a stall at the public engagement event: Mind and Matter – a day of discovery and inspiration for curious minds, organised by the Engagement with Research team and held in the Medicine and Physics buildings. Over 60 stalls represented research and activities across the university https://impact.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/engagement-with-research/mind-and-matter-2024/. Katy, Ian and George’s exhibit included pollen and mosses under the microscope, 3D printed pollen grains, a peat core, ballons, photos, and lots of enthusiastic explanation from us about how pollen is used to understand past environments.
- Sustainability-themed tours of Eden Campus with Dr Lydia Cole (Geography & Sustainable Development) and Karen Primrose (best job title ever: Head of Special Projects)
- A discussion panel on ‘AI and Sustainability’ with Prof Simon Dobson and Dr Tristan Henderson (Computer Science), Dr Ioana Colfescu (Earth & Environmental Sciences, Maths, and National Centre for Atmospheric Science) and Calum McDonald (Scottish AI Alliance), chaired by Dr Louise Reid (Geography & Sustainable development)
- A masterclass for MSc students on the topic of Eco Translation, led by Prof Michael Cronin Senior Global Fellow jointly sponsored by StACCS/SGSD and Modern Languages, with Prof Nina Laurie (Geography & Sustainable Development) and Prof Catherine O’Leary (Modern Languages)
- A workshop on ‘Photovoice and how it can be used to inform sustainable development research’ by Dr Mary Abed Al Ahad(Geography & Sustainable Development)
- Film viewing of The Lorax, organised by Dr Lydia Cole in collaboration with StACCS, BIRCH, Student Environment Team and Green Film Club.
- ‘Crafternoon’ in the School of Geography & Sustainable Development, organised by Dr Charlotte Lee, with the special guest of climate activist Jean Kemp from the North Sea Knitters who was knitting red scarfs to represent the red line of 1.5 degrees of warming, and who brought along spare wool and needles to teach others to knit.
- StACCS Co-Directors Dr Ian Lawson and Dr Louise Reid presented the work of the Centre as part of a Baden-Württemberg Ministerial Visit to Eden Campus.
- Dr Ian Lawson hosted Pete Cairns of Northwoods Rewilding https://www.scotlandbigpicture.com/northwoods for a research seminar on ‘Transdisciplinary Approaches to Sustainable Landscapes’, with colleagues joining from the Schools of Biology (Dr Ian Matthews), Geography & Sustainable Development (Drs Lydia Cole, Althea Davies, Katy Roucoux, Rehema White), Business (Dr Shona Russell), Social Anthropology (Dr Cornelia Helmke), Psychology & Neuroscience (Dr Stefan Pulver) with Jenny Gilbertson of Forest and Land Scotland.
- We had an informal drop-in coffee with some of the team from the Corrour Estate to make some introductions and talk about the developing research plans.
- StACCS’ activities for the week were excellently rounded off by a panel discussion on ‘Island Thinking’, co-organised by Prof Nina Laurie (Geography & Sustainable Development) and Prof Catherine O’Leary (Modern Languages) with Prof Michael Cronin (Senior Global Fellow), Prof Dan Clayton (Geography & Sustainable Development), Prof Karen Brown (Art History) and Dr Niall Sreenan (Modern Languages).
Our ability and enthusiasm to organise and run such a diversity of events reassuringly suggests the high importance people attach to sustainability in all its guises, and over the next few weeks we will feature more reflective blogs about some of the activities listed above.
Photos, clockwise from top left: 1) AI and Sustainability panel, 2) Baden-Württemberg Ministerial Visit to Eden Campus, 3) Lorax viewing, 4) Transdisciplinary Approaches to Sustainable Landscapes, 5) Mind and Matter – a day of discovery and inspiration for curious minds, 6) StACCS logo.