Our interns have been busy this summer. Keep reading to learn more about what they've been up to.
This summer, the Office for Sustainability welcomed a cohort of outstanding student interns who tackled projects ranging from promoting Green Athletics and advancing our Zero Waste program, to helping our team reach out to UVA units on strategic sustainability planning and analyzing the supply chain for UVA labs. Not only was it a true pleasure to have them in the office these past many weeks, individually and collectively, they advanced UVA's sustainability efforts, and we are so grateful!
Cam Bentley
I focused specifically on student outreach and engagement. While my work has been quite diverse, I've focused primarily on three areas: move in/out, Green Games at Scott Stadium, and Green Athletics. For move in/out, I began by researching best practices at other institutions. From there, I brainstormed improvements to the current Hoos Reuse program and began initial communications with off-grounds contacts. For Green Games, I reviewed logistics, brainstormed fan engagement strategies, created big screen graphics, wrote PA announcements, and connected with athletic media to create promotional material with the football players. For Green Athletics, I wrote a yearly review and two case studies, summarized the results of our environmental literacy survey, revamped the Instagram, updated content for the web page, and began work to create a formal donation infrastructure between Virginia athletics and a nonprofit organization called Leveling the Playing Field. Overall, I've really enjoyed my internship this summer and am grateful for the opportunity to support UVA sustainability.
Nora Raleigh
This summer, I have worked on several different projects at OFS, including creating a Zero Waste Binder to support Zero Waste Events, tracking donor engagement, helping gather metrics for the Annual Report, and creating many infographics for different events and opportunities. Along with my individual work, I have shared several projects with my fellow interns. Together, we maintained the Student Garden at biweekly workdays, organized three Student Garden Pop-Up Farmstand events, and tabled at Orientation Resource Fair events throughout July. Throughout the summer, I have been focused on preparing to return to my position as a Sustainability Student Employee this Fall by organizing logistics materials for my team, drafting communications and graphics, and preparing to jump into Green Games, Corner Cleanups, and Student Garden happenings as soon as the Fall semester begins.
Becca Danese
My name is Becca Danese and I'm currently a summer intern and will be the Green Living Team Leader in the fall. It will be my second year working in the Office for Sustainability. This summer, I've worked on restructuring the Eco-Leader/Sustainability Committee program, met with Housing and Residence Life members, and prepared presentations for RAs and SRs. I've also been working on welcome events and Fall programming, primarily for new students. I've done some work with Green Dining and in the Student Garden as well, and built a lot of Kahoots and graphics for all these events!
Ben Nilson
After studying abroad in Valencia, Spain for five weeks, I joined OFS's strategic planning team which works with individual schools and units to develop customized sustainability plans. Much of my work has focused on the UVA Health system, where we have recently partnered with Practice Greenhealth, a non-profit membership organization working for sustainable health care solutions. I have helped design a sustainability webpage for UVA Health, and written a blog post about grassroots clinician sustainability efforts. I've greatly enjoyed my time with OFS, and look forward to continuing my work with strategic planning initiatives.
Yushun Ding
This summer, I have been working on a lab supply chain audit project with three targeted labs. The goal is to reduce the environmental footprints in lab spaces and cultivate a culture of sustainability among lab occupants by assessing the practices in the supply chain, including procurement, inventory and waste management. Additionally, I organized a master sheet on previous Green Labs participants, designed Fall communications plans and prepared for a student organization presentation. I enjoyed all the work very much, and I hope we can implement them well this Fall.
Krysten Kuhn
My project for the Decarbonization Academy tackles occupant behavior change, specifically regarding plug load energy use. After researching a variety of energy-related behaviors, I settled on plug loads due to the high potential for energy savings and likelihood of effective behavior change. My recent work has focused on developing three campaign proposals: one focusing on dorm laundry machine use, one addressing outdated appliance replacement, and one looking at consolidating appliances in break rooms and office spaces. By presenting each proposal to the Office for Sustainability, I hope to gain support and traction for the implementation of these campaign ideas in the near future.
Viswajith Govinda Rajan
As part of the Decarbonization Academy, I worked on building decarbonization efforts with Ethan Heil from OFS. We worked on a bunch of projects ranging from Building Energy Program retrofit case studies, to data collection and building a roadmap framework for buildings to use as a guide in their decarbonization efforts. In addition, I worked on two side projects: I built a data analysis tool for the air handling units at the Biomedical Engineering lab (MR5), and have been working on designed a dashboard for the "Shut the Sash" program in the Chemistry lab.
Michelle Tran
As a member of this summer's Decarbonization Academy, I was part of the Building Decarbonization team. We developed two decarbonization roadmaps - one for the School of Medicine and one for the School of Engineering. In these roadmap reports, we provided them each with an analysis of their buildings, a suggested timeline of action to address their building portfolios, and recommended strategies to improve their energy efficiency and reduce their carbon output. In doing so, we have created case study documents of previous Building Efficiency Program projects, a case study template for future projects, two new performance indicators (the Energy Deficiency Cost and the Facility Performance Index), a new energy classification of buildings, and a roadmap guidebook which will assist other UVA schools and peer institutions in creating their own decarbonization roadmaps. In addition to this larger project, we also supported other ongoing energy efficiency projects around Grounds such as developing energy visualization apps for MR5, performing energy audits for Carr's Hill (President Jim Ryan's residence), and creating sustainability guides for a new engineering building.
Olivia Regehr
This summer as a Green Labs student intern with the Office for Sustainability, my primary project has been writing a research paper on the connection between refrigerants and environmental justice. I was able to interview several volunteers who provided valuable insight as I developed my paper due to their varying perspectives and expertise on the technical side of refrigerant chemicals and cold storage unit maintenance as well as those familiar with environmental justice issues. I have also had the wonderful opportunity to collaborate with the Sustainable Labs team on in-person lab visits for de-icing that my co-intern and I will be presenting to student organizations to get more involved in our program in the future.
