How can you participate?

1. Join daily collective learning and action opportunities:
   • Monday (4/20), 3:30-4:30pm – (virtual) Q&A with Ronnie Cummins, national director of the Organic Consumers Association and author of Grassroots Rising: A Call to Action on Climate, Farming, Food, and a Green New Deal. !
   • Tuesday (4/21) – “Contact your legislators” challenge! Check for details and/or go to for information on how to call and what issues you can call in about!
   • Wednesday (4/22) – EarthDayLive2020 – STRIKE theme, amplifying indigenous and youth stories (RSVP required).
   • Thursday (4/23) – (virtual) Sustainability Conversation with Augsburg Alum – details TBD
   • Friday (4/24), 7pm – (virtual) Movie Watch Party – details TBD.
2. Find other on this list compiled by the Environmental Stewardship Coordinators team. Add your own ideas! Take action whenever you can, in whatever way you can!
3. Share your actions with the or on other social media platforms using #AuggieEarthWeek2020 (and any other hashtags your networks are using this week – for example, #EarthDay2020, #BetterTogether, #ClimateJustice4All, #StayHomeButNotSilent).
4. for a chance to win a sustainability care package!

The post Auggies Act For Earth Week! appeared first on Environmental Stewardship.

(By Allyson Green, Chief Sustainability Officer)

On April 22, 1970, students across the country organized teaching-ins that demanded action on unrestrained pollution that threatened the ecological systems that support life. As our current reality of a global pandemic has shifted plans for the 50th anniversary of Earth Day (and every other milestone the Augsburg community was planning to celebrate), the student Environmental Stewardship Coordinators and I have found ourselves grieving. What about the we were going to mobilize students to participate in? What about the coffee tasting and panel that would highlight the connections between social, environmental, economic, and personal health? We are already anxious about what the climate crisis means for our current and future health and well-being, and now how will COVID-19 change that?

In Minnesota, our health and well-being can be predicted by the color of our skin, economic status, immigration status, gender identity and sexual orientation, and other characteristics of who we are. We could all spend the next 10 days of our stay-at-home order getting lost in . COVID-19 is exposing vulnerabilities in our society that have long been present and experienced most intensely by marginalized groups of people.

And so, even in our grief, visions of a future where all inhabitants of this planet (human and non-human) can thrive are emerging more strongly and becoming more possible. A that doesn’t leave anyone behind is not only possible but necessary, and this is what helps fuel my daily hope and work.

What if everyone had healthcare that covers all of our needs, regardless of immigration status and ability to pay? What if all young people – black, brown, indigenous, LGBTQIA – had what they needed to succeed in school and follow their dreams? What if our worth didn’t depend on our productivity and consumption? And what if we all had the clean air, water, and food our bodies need to thrive?

The framework for sustainability that we use at Augsburg captures the interconnectedness of everything happening right now and reminds us that public health disasters, economic collapses, and social upheavals are not isolated events and are also inherently environmental crises. Our colleagues from the graciously share this model from their own community, honoring Ojibwe culture, that resonates with the Lutheran theology under-girding our institutional values as well.

How is your daily life illustrating these connections right now? My own mental health wavers with my ability to get outside and walk or bike around my neighborhood. As traffic has slowed on the highways, I’m reminded that my physical health is connected to the air quality around me, and I can feel the difference in my lungs. Today, my rent is due, and I’m grateful to still be employed, even as so many of my neighbors are waiting for unemployment checks before they can pay their own rent. How are these connections between wellness, social, economic, and environmental systems playing out on a community, state, national, and global scale right now?

When these systems are out of balance, we have opportunities to change the way they adapt and relate to each other moving forward, but only as we address the root causes of the imbalances to begin with. In , Vijay Kolinjivadi makes direct connections between our global exploitative economy and the climate and COVID-19 crises. We created these problems. And we can resolve them while changing direction towards an . Kolinjivadi reminds us, “the rapid and urgent actions in response to the virus and the inspiring examples of mutual aid also illustrate that society is more than capable of acting collectively in the face of grave danger to the whole of humanity.”

So, as I get ready to move on from this blog to my next task of the day, I’ll pull out the notebook I’m now using to keep track of projects while working from home. The notebook itself has become a daily reminder to keep these connections and possibilities at the top of my mind. The first half of the pages are full of notes from my graduate school GIS and epidemiology classes. As the tracking COVID-19 change daily, and , those frameworks for understanding the world are now literally and figuratively the foundation of the projects the Environmental Stewardship Coordinators and I are continuing to work on (virtually) together. A solid understanding of the connections between people and planetary health and wellbeing can help us move towards a Just Transition. We grieve our current losses, and we rejoice in the potential gains we can help enact for more equitable social, economic, wellness, and environmental systems.

Will you this month in celebrating a long history of environmental advocacy that began generations before April 22, 1970 and will continue generations after COVID-19?

The post Earth Month In A Time Of Transition appeared first on Environmental Stewardship.

Anna Cox (‘22) describes training and strategies for caucusing below:

This will be my first time caucusing, and at first the process and information was overwhelming and confusing. I feel this is the best way I can add my voice and advocate for issues I am passionate about. I will be joining others tonight at 7:00 at the University of Minnesota to caucus for climate change and for PlannedParenthood. If you would like to join meet in the Christensen lobby at 6:15 pm. If you are interested in caucusing for the Republican Party it will be held in Humphrey School of Public Affairs room 50B and for Democratic-Farmer-Labor will be held in Fraser Hall #101.

Caucus For An Issue:

Across the state, the , a statewide coalition that includes MN350 who trained us on this process, is encouraging people to Caucus for the Climate – to attend precinct caucuses and volunteer to be a Climate Delegate who will bring climate on to the next level of decision-making within each party. On January 23rd the Environmental Stewardship Committee held a Caucus for the Climate House Party, led by Andrew Marks, Blongsha Hang, and Allyson Green, and there were about twenty-five student attendees. During the caucus house party there was a focus on the climate crisis, who is responsible for the crisis, and what action can be taken to address and resolve the climate crisis. Even within our own state, Minnesota winters are warming ten times faster than our summers, and the ripple effects of climate change will be experienced by everyone. Just a three to four degree increase would cause inevitable and reversible damage, and our failure to act will be felt by current and future generations. This is why caucusing is so important and needed. Climate action bills are stuck in state senate and caucusing is a way to bring up the issues and resolutions the everyday citizen is passionate about.

Six of the Augsburg student attendees committed to being a Climate Delegate. This sounds scary but literally means sitting through lots of other decisions at the caucus meeting (and either participating or doing your homework) until it’s time to elect delegates to the next round of party gatherings in March/April. Then, you just raise your hand and volunteer to be a delegate who will ask potential candidates how they will lead on climate action. So, in order for those candidates to get your vote, they need to demonstrate how they will take action, and then you will be able to hold them accountable for that action if they get elected. Caucusing is the purest form of democracy that we currently have in today’s governmental system, and this is a way beyond voting where you can share your own voice.

**Want to Caucus for the Climate? Sign up here and and stop by the ShareShop to grab a button to show your support!**

Caucus For A Candidate:

Another strategy for participating in the caucuses is to become a delegate for a specific candidate, to help them gain the support of the party. People caucus for specific candidates on the local, state, and national level. On Thursday February 6th, Planned Parenthood and Minnesota360 held a caucus training and informational session at the University of Minnesota during which we discussed what caucusing is and why it’s important. The session focused on how to become a delegate for a specific presidential candidate, something especially relevant for the 2020 elections.

The post Are you caucusing tonight? appeared first on Environmental Stewardship.

Last Thursday of the Month, 5-6:30pm in Hagfors 108

(Readings updated before each event – check back!)

February 28
*Theme = Fair Trade

• Reading:
• Podcasts: (8 mins);  (5 mins) (We’ll listen together in case you don’t get time to beforehand)

March 28
*Theme = Zero Waste

• Reading: Changing behaviors promises to impede plastics pollution
• Reading:

April 24
*Theme = Environmental Justice

Join and share on !

The post Sustain-Sip-Stories Monthly Gatherings appeared first on Environmental Stewardship.