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Sustainability

Connecting students with Indigenous leaders
Tirua Sur Chile statues In Tirua Sur, Chile, carved wooden figures called chemamüll mark the graves of deceased Mapuche people. (Image: Tulia Falleti)

Connecting students with Indigenous leaders

People of the Land, a new Penn Global seminar taught by political science Professor Tulia Falleti, enables students to learn from Indigenous community members in South America.

Kristina Linnea García

The stories trees tell
cherry blossoms in front of fisher library Penn is the only Ivy League university with a campus that is an accredited arboretum. This recognition underscores a commitment to rigorously care for the University’s thousands of trees, representing hundreds of species.

The stories trees tell

In a photo essay, Penn Today highlights some of campus’s most iconic trees.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Penn group wins EPA Campus RainWorks Challenge
A sketch of adults and children looking over a lush rain garden

Penn group wins EPA Campus RainWorks Challenge

The student-led project will reimagine the campus of West Philadelphia’s Andrew Hamilton School, including vegetable gardens, a food forest, and other green stormwater-management tools.

Katherine Unger Baillie

A ‘human-focused approach’ to sustainability
Nina Morris against the backdrop of an urban farm

Nina Morris, Penn's sustainability director, hopes to engage more members of the campus community by “meeting people where they are, showing up to support them and their interests, and then finding out how their passions connect to sustainability.”

A ‘human-focused approach’ to sustainability

Sustainability Director Nina Morris, who started at Penn in October, aims to build on the University’s strengths in creating a more sustainable campus and community.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Wolf administration to buy half of state government’s electricity from solar

Wolf administration to buy half of state government’s electricity from solar

Mark Hughes of the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy said Pennsylvania’s solar fields will provide jobs and tax revenue and move the state toward clean energy. “You want to make it hip, you want to make it cheap—but eventually you’re going to have to make it mandatory,” he said.

2020 Green Purchasing Awards announced
Ceramic tea cup on a saucer on a counter at work.

2020 Green Purchasing Awards announced

Weitzman’s Megan Ryerson and Engineering’s Cheryl Hickey are awarded for their contributions to sustainable purchasing in travel consumption and kitchen waste streams.

Barbara Lea-Kruger

On Galápagos beaches, human presence conclusively affects sea lions
Person standing outside on a rocky beach holding a clipboard and wearing a t-shirt that reads "Penn." Three sea lions lay on the beach at the front of the photo.

Twice a week between June and December of 2017 and 2018, local Galapagueño students observed sea lion behavior at four local beaches. The community scientists assessed how frequently the animals growled, barked, and moved toward the observer, as well as conducted an overall census of the animals. (Pre-pandemic image: Courtesy Michael Weisberg)

On Galápagos beaches, human presence conclusively affects sea lions

Penn researchers, in conjunction with Galapagueño high school students, found that on more crowded beaches, the endangered animals are less aggressive to people.

Michele W. Berger