NSU’s sustainability work on campus growing

By Ashley Diaz •

NSU President George L. Hanbury II cut the ribbon at the grand opening of the community garden on March 6.

“We open up this garden to students to learn about sustainability,” said Hanbury at the grand opening.

The community garden is part of an effort by NSU to become a more sustainable campus and reduce its carbon footprint.

“Our main goal is to really bring awareness of the efforts that we are doing and really drive the small changes that students make and lead them to giant impacts,” said Caleb Siguenza, student sustainability coordinator and junior neuro-science major.

The Office of Facilities Management is involved in many programs to make NSU a more sustainable campus. They competed several times in the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System to deter-mine how sustainable NSU is in comparison with other institutions.

In the STARS program, institutions had to report data from across campus, such as water and energy usage, to show how sustainable their campuses are. Universities earn points to-ward a platinum, gold, silver, bronze or reporter ranking, with platinum being the highest. Most Ivy League schools get a ranking of gold and spend a significant amount of money to gain that ranking. NSU received a bronze ranking in 2017 and 2020, and a silver ranking in 2022.

“Achieving silver is a really good thing, just one step away from gold,” said Jonathan Miller, senior controls and energy engineer.

Tatum Hendrick, student sustainability coordinator and junior chemistry and neuro-science major, also worked on a project to put stickers on the fume hoods on campus. Fume hoods are ventilation exhaust systems in laboratories that control the inhalation of any hazardous chemicals. When the fume hoods are left open, they use a lot of energy, so the stickers are a reminder to close them.

“We found from a case study at UC Davis, in conjunction with the Department of Energy, that they could save up to $13,000 in energy costs per fume hood per year using this-method,” said Hendrick.

Another initiative Facilities Management has implemented is the Community Garden, which is on 3770 SW 76th Ave. About 60 undergraduate volunteers created the community garden, which lets students grow their own food and reduce shipping costs and energy usage associated with shipping food around the world.

“One thing I’m currently working on at the Community Garden is trying to get more wildflowers to grow,” said Siguenza. “We are trying to do it sustainably by starting them off as seedlings and growing them ourselves.”

The Community Garden is a way to introduce native plants on NSU campuses. The garden already has a variety of native plants, like the Everglades tomato. It has many species of bees and a species of rare butterfly called the Kuti. As the garden introduces more flowers, the hope is to introduce all 80 species of bees and more Kuti butterflies.

“The Nature Club Native Narrows Wildflower Garden is certified as a National Wildlife Federation Habitat, and we intend to include the Community Garden in that as well,” said Hendrick. “We are actively expanding wildlife habitats here on campus as well.”

If students are interested in signing up for a plot at the Community Garden, they can follow the student-run Instagram account, @nsucommuni-tygarden. In the account’s Story Highlights, there is a direct link to the website to sign up for a plot, as well as a link to another website that gives more information about the Community Garden.

“Through future awareness campaigns, we hope to bring more knowledge about sustainability to more students on campus,” said Hendrick.
Students can also plant a tree somewhere on campus at the annual Arbor Day event on April 24. While the event is being planned, its main focus will be to bring awareness to how trees can benefit people and the environment.