UConn was recognized as the 10th most sustainable university in the world according to UI GreenMetric, an international system that reviews 1,477 global universities in 95 countries for sustainability performance. This is the fourth year in a row that UConn has made their top ten list. 

Read the full story on UConn Today.

The highly anticipated UConn Halloween event of the year, Haunted HEEP, will be Wednesday, October 23 from 7p-9:30p. Rain date is Thursday, October 24.

Haunted HEEP is a free, one mile scary hike through Hillside Environmental Education Park (HEEP). The HEEP is a remediated landfill area and natural forest reserve on the UConn-Storrs campus, behind the Innovation Partnership Building. The Office of Sustainability hosts the event to introduce guests to one of the closest trails to campus in the hopes they visit on their own in the future.

Everyone is welcome to attend but you MUST fill out this waiver.

Check in at the HEEP Trailhead Parking Lot between 7pm-9:30pm. T-shirts will be given to the first 100 students to survive the Haunted HEEP!

Be Part of UConn’s Award Winning Halloween Event

Every year, the Office of Sustainability hosts a haunted trail walk at the Hillside Environmental Education Park (HEEP), which is located behind the Innovation Partnership Building. This year, the Haunted HEEP will be held on Wednesday October 23rd. We are looking for volunteers from clubs, organizations and UConn departments to lead different scare stations along the trail. This is a great opportunity to have fun with your friends, get service hours, and promote your organization! Last year, over 700 students attended this event, and we are anticipating breaking 1,000 this year! Any group that sponsors a station will have their logo featured on all promotional materials and correspondence!

Each group will invent or be assigned a scare station (some example scenes from the past are IT Clown, exorcism, forest ritual, and haunted circus). Your group must show up at 5:30 p.m. on October 23rd, but you can set up your scene earlier if needed. Please have 2-15 people in your group. Dinner is provided, as is a limited edition Haunted HEEP t-shirt.

We also ask that at least one representative from each club attend one of our trail walkthrough dates so that they understand the set up of the trail and how the event will work. These dates are Saturday October 19, 12-1 p.m. OR Tuesday October 22, 3-4 p.m. Please indicate on the form for which of these dates you will have a representative from your club participating in the trail walkthrough.

The rain date for Haunted HEEP is Thursday October 24th. Please feel free to reach out if you have any questions! We have up to 25 potential stations, so this is on a first-come, first-serve basis! We’d love to see your club at one of UConn’s scariest and most well-attended events.

THE DETAILS

• Wednesday Oct. 23 (rain date Oct. 24)
• Volunteer from 5:30pm to 10pm
• AND a representative from your group must do a trail walk through on Saturday October 19 12-1 p.m. OR Tuesday October 22 3-4 p.m.
• Free dinner and limited edition Haunted HEEP t shirt

SIGN UP HERE

UConn’s Office of Sustainability will be hosting a team of 11 AmeriCorps members this fall to implement campus and community led climate action. The positions are part of the Campus Climate Action Corps (CCAC) within national nonprofit and higher education civic engagement leader, Campus Compact. CCAC is the first nationwide AmeriCorps program solely dedicated to campus-based, community-led climate action. CCAC builds the capacity of campuses and their community partners to create change that leads to increased energy efficiency and improvements for at-risk ecosystems by implementing local solutions for underserved communities.  

CCAC is also an inaugural Implementing Partner for President Joe Biden’s American Climate Corps, a new initiative working to address climate change and environmental injustice via workforce training and service. Teams of AmeriCorps members serving host sites around the US will facilitate collaborative efforts to promote environmental awareness and to mitigate the impacts of the climate crisis in their surrounding communities.  

CCAC has recently received a grant from Serve Connecticut for a state based CCAC Connecticut (CCAC CT) cohort which will launch in September with an anticipated 40 CCAC CT AmeriCorps members serving at 8 different host sites throughout the state. As part of the CCAC CT team, two full-time and nine part-time positions will be supporting UConn’s sustainability efforts. The full-time Regional Campus Sustainability and Environmental Justice Coordinator will focus on coordinating sustainability and environmental justice efforts at UConn’s four regional campuses, the UConn Health Center, the School of Law, and in the communities they serve. They’ll lead sustainability education and outreach programming, assess campus and community needs, build relationships with community organizations working on sustainability and environmental justice initiatives, and help develop an environmental justice fellowship program for UConn. They’ll have six part-time student CCAC members to assist with related service projects.

The full-time EcoCaptains and Community Outreach Coordinator will focus on managing the EcoCaptain Internship program at UConn’s main Storrs campus. The EcoCaptain internship program places sustainability educators and ambassadors at each residence hall, where they host environmental programming and assist with the Office of Sustainability’s engagement events and behavior change initiatives focused on energy and water conservation and recycling. The new coordinator will provide leadership and mentorship in support of three additional part-time CCAC CT members to serve as EcoCaptains at several off-campus apartment complexes, The Oaks, Celeron Square and Carriage House Apartments. These members will be especially engaged in providing energy efficiency assessments for residents and leading community zero-waste efforts to reduce litter surrounding campus in collaboration with the Town of Mansfield.

Sally Slovenski, Program Director of the Campus Climate Action Corps shares, “We are inspired by UConn’s dedication to improving environmental stewardship for economically disadvantaged populations and look forward to working alongside its campuses in 2024-2025 to build community partnerships to reduce the impacts of climate change across the state!”

“The addition of these resources to support our growing regional campuses and students on and off campus could not have come at a more critical time. Climate change is already impacting our state and stands to disproportionately affect our most vulnerable communities in underserved and underrepresented areas. Energy costs have also never been higher, and commuter students already living near or below the poverty line stand to benefit especially from the energy efficiency audits and interventions provided by CCAC CT members. We are excited to have been chosen as a host site by CCAC CT and are eager to begin recruitment for these new AmeriCorps positions and student experiential learning opportunities,” says Patrick McKee, Interim Director of the UConn Office of Sustainability.

Application instructions will be posted on American Climate Corps website soon, with an expected start date of Sept 23rd, 2024. 

Is your student organization or department hosting an event related to sustainability? Need help getting the word out at UConn?

Fill out our new form and we may be able to share it on our social media channels, digital dashboard screens, and in our monthly newsletter.

Please give at least 2 weeks notice and know that we may not have the staff power to share all events, depending on our existing obligations.

Sustainability Event Form

 

*Note – don’t forget to add your event to the University Event Calendar and tag it “sustainability” for even greater viewership.