Eco Equity Challenge

 

The GW Eco Equity Challenge

 

With a campus located four blocks from the White House and adjacent to the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, it would be easy for GW students to continually think on a national and international scale, forgetting that there are communities right next door experiencing their share of urban social and environmental challenges. Our Eco-Equity Challenge Program aims to help undergraduate and graduate students connect with underserved residents of Washington, D.C., to share their skills and find solutions to environmental and social justice issues.

In 2015, GWs Honey W. Nashman Center for Civic Engagement and Public Service and Office of Sustainability partnered with Siemens Industry, Inc. Building Technologies Division to launch the program. Applicants must develop their projects in collaboration with one or more community partners, and be supported by a faculty member. GW student entrepreneurs receive funds, training, and mentoring from Sustainability and the Nashman Center to implement their projects. To qualify, projects must also raise awareness within the GW community about environmental or climate justice. The program links students to the broader community, helping build their understanding of challenges in an urban environment — and how to solve them — and sharing what they learn with others at the university.

students install rain barrel

 

Naamal DeSilva and volunteers

 

hands in soil

 

Application Details

  • Interested students are encouraged to meet with Kimberly Williams in the Office of Sustainability to discuss project ideas prior to submitting an application. Reach Kimberly at [email protected].
  • Interested students are encouraged to submit a proposal as a team, and must have a GW Faculty Advisor and a local community partner.
  • Project proposals must incorporate an environmental and social justice component, to be completed during the 2019-2020 academic year.
  • Application deadline is February 7, 2021.

 

Eco Equity Challenge Application

Past Projects

The most recent project, led by GW student Logan Malik, aimed to address the impacts of climate change in Washington, D.C. by expanding an existing greenhouse gas monitoring project into underserved communities in the District. Logan worked with high school students to build and install rooftop CO2 sensors that monitor greenhouse gas emissions. He then developed curriculum to educate the students on climate change and its impact on communities like theirs.  By engaging the students in the construction of the sensors and showing them a practical use of engineering, computer science, and chemistry, Logan helped to bridge the gap between scientific research and local community members

students install carbon dioxide sensor on school roof

 

 

In the first round of the Eco-Equity Challenge, several students partnered with Higher Achievement, a nonprofit organization providing middle-school enrichment programs, to develop a year-long program of community-based mapping and geography education for middle schoolers in an underserved neighborhood of D.C.

 

“The students were keen to work with Legos, maps, paint and other mediums to help them learn about the physical world through more tactile activities. We hope to introduce the students to concepts like climate change, gentrification, food security, environmental degradation, global cultures and many others through the use of novel and innovative new approaches to geographic education” -Arzoo Malhotra, GW student.

 

Another project involved teaching local students to use mapping technology to spotlight green spaces and other natural features in their own neighborhoods. Ellie Davis was a GW Eco-Equity Challenge student participant. She has since graduated and was able to apply the experience to her University of South Carolina Geography PhD program.

 

“The Eco-Equity Challenge provided my team with an opportunity to bolster environmental education and communication, a critical first step to ensuring a clean, safe, healthy world for current and future generations"-Ellie Davis, GW student.