Sustainability fee allots funds to hire assistants, six reps
The fee is $1 per student per semester.
Published May 4, 2009
Money from the sustainability fee will go toward graduate assistants and funding projects to provide for a greener MU.
The plan for the student fee will be spent to hire two graduate assistants, six "SustainaReps" and the rest of the fee will be used to fund projects and proposals, said Pat Margherio, Sustain Mizzou student adviser and sustainability committee member.
The SustainaReps will be undergraduate students working on education and programming for sustainability initiatives across campus, said Tina Casagrand, Sustain Mizzou vice president of programming.
Although Sustain Mizzou has no formal connection with the fee, the group advocates sustainability on campus and the projects the fee would go toward.
"The sustainability fee will provide funding for sustainability initiatives and to hire student workers to assist with these initiatives," sustainability coordinator Steve Burdic said in an e-mail. "A detailed plan should be available by July 1."
The fee of $1 per student per semester will bring in about $52,000 next year, which is subject to change based on enrollment, Margherio said.
The graduate students will help guide the SustainaReps and prepare grant proposals along with other duties, for which they will be paid about $13,000 per year.
"They will actively pursue, look for and apply for outside grants to try and bring in more money for this endeavor," Margherio said. "One of the main things that they will do is work to try and bring that money to the university."
The remainder of the fee will be a budget for the graduate and undergraduate students.
"Primarily what I think we're going to be using it for is proposals and getting input from people about bigger projects that we can work on," Margherio said. "We're kind of leaving this pretty open because we're not sure what projects we're going to want to pursue."
The projects to be pursued will be decided by the graduate assistants and members of the sustainability committee.
"It will be a committee process, and they will be figuring out what the best use will be," Margherio said. "The first criteria of anything that we do or implement is going to be how this affects students directly, how many students are going to be affected by this and what it does for them."
Burdic's new position as sustainability coordinator allows him to expand his duties from just waste management to connecting sustainability efforts across campus. Burdic will also assist the eight students who are hired by the sustainability fee.
Other moves to help the campus become more sustainable and environmentally friendly include changing the Chancellor's Environmental Affairs Committee to include sustainability issues.
"They will make recommendations to the provost on the development of policies for environmental and sustainability issues, develop formal and informal mechanisms for improved education to enhance environmental and sustainability awareness and provide a biannual sustainability report to the chancellor," Burdic said.
The ultimate goal behind the improved sustainability is to make the campus more environmentally friendly.
"We are striving for a comprehensive, well thought out plan of sustainability and an approach to becoming a more sustainable campus," Margherio said. "We want the entirety of campus to move together toward more sustainable choices."