The final day of Wake Forest’s annual Earth Month was a celebratory one.
On Wednesday, April 30, students, faculty, and staff gathered in the Green Room of Reynolda Hall for the 12th annual Champions of Change Campus Sustainability Awards. The awards were co-presented by Provost Michele Gillespie and Vice President for Institutional Sustainability, Dedee DeLongpré Johnston.
This year, six individuals joined the ranks of over 130 Wake Forest students, faculty, and staff who have been named Champions of Change since the awards program started in 2014, a contingent of whom were present at Wednesday’s celebration.
Awards were presented across four main categories: Resource Conservation, Academics & Engagement, Service & Social Action, and Bright Ideas. As is tradition, “Everyday Champion” awards were presented to colleagues who went above and beyond in their commitment to sustainability in their everyday work.
Hannah Duane was named an Everyday Champion for her integration of waste reduction and diversion principles into the University’s homecoming celebrations. As event operations & project manager for University Development and Alumni Engagement, Hannah championed ways to reduce waste during homecoming events, including re-using pom poms from previous years as decor, repurposing centerpieces, and encouraging attendees to bring their own water bottles to “choose to re-use” at all events. She also partnered with the Office of Sustainability to make Homecoming’s largest on-campus gathering, Party, So Dear, a zero-landfill event.
Seth Looney was named an Everyday Champion for his support of campus engaged learning through the integration of the stormwater management features and utility projects under his purview into courses and assignments. This past year, Seth led campus stormwater tours, served as a guest speaker at the Tohi Garden, and assisted with heating plant visits. Through it all, he equipped students with knowledge about sustainability work happening behind the scenes, while keeping them interested and engaged with his humor.
Steve Smith was named this year’s Champion of Change for Academics & Engagement. Since joining the Wake Forest faculty in 2020, Dr. Smith has partnered with the Office of Sustainability to integrate engaged learning activities for sustainability into 11 classes, reaching nearly 200 students. His classes have explored a wide variety of sustainability learning spaces on Wake Forest’s campus, introducing students to concepts like regenerative agriculture demonstrated at the Campus Garden, district heating and cooling at the campus heating plant, ecosystem services at the Reynolda wetlands, and stormwater management at the Tohi garden.
Jimmy Nifong received this year’s Resource Conservation Champions of Change award for his technical oversight and coordination of the renewal and expansion of the university’s South Chiller Plant. The project successfully expanded the capacity of our campus chilled water generation systems from 6,000 to 7,200 tons of cooling and increased efficiency. District heating and cooling infrastructure is a top global climate solution employed at Wake Forest. In addition to his stewardship of the South Chiller plant project this year, Jimmy has also been at the helm of the university’s emissions monitoring, tracking, and reporting for the past 15 years, ensuring we’re on the right track to meet our goal of climate neutrality by 2040.
Chef Jonathan Burns was awarded this year’s Service & Social Action award for his commitment to prioritizing products that have earned third-party certification for environmental and social responsibility and for his support of independent small-scale farming operations that prioritize the health of soil, ecosystems, and communities. As Director of Culinary Development for Harvest Table Culinary Group at Wake Forest, Chef Burns has led an innovative partnership with regional food hub 4P Foods, demonstrating how institutional buying power can leverage new markets. He has also initiated a sustainable sourcing weekly auditing process that has been recognized at the highest levels of Harvest Table Culinary Group and is serving as a model for other accounts to follow. Thanks to Chef Burns and his team’s efforts, we at Wake Forest are now consistently achieving – and even exceeding – our goal of sourcing 30% of our food, by spend, from third-party certified producers, reaching an all-time high of 37% just last month.
Tim Kerr received this year’s Bright Idea award for creating a unique surplus “shopping” opportunity to help rehome 383 units of furniture and other goods from Alumni Hall following Advancement’s move to the UCC. The effort diverted over 33,000 pounds – approximately 16 tons – from the landfill and represented nearly $230,000 in avoided costs for new furnishings and supplies for offices and departments across campus. In addition to spearheading the Alumni Hall cleanout, Tim also created a new Surplus and Events Equipment Rental System for campus that resulted in a cost-effective inventory matched to campus needs, reducing the need to source from external vendors with high mark-ups.
The Office of Sustainability extends congratulations to all of this year’s nominees and award winners. We commend them for leading the sustainability transformation on campus.
Photos from the Twelfth annual Champions of Change Campus Sustainability Awards can be viewed here.