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Services
The Sustainability Academy offers a variety of fee-based services to for-profit and non-profit organizations. To find out how our services can benefit your organization, please contact us.
Sustainability Assessments and Reporting
Curriculum Design
Customized Classes and Workshops
Research and Evaluation
Speaker Bureau
Sustainability Assessments and Reporting
All types of organizations, from individual households to international corporations, can benefit from systematic assessments of their operations and impacts. The Sustainability Academy offers a proven method of assessment, planning, and reporting that can assist organizations in attaining eco-efficient cost savings and stimulating innovation.
Assessment
The first step on the path to sustainability for any organization is to establish a reliable baseline: what is the current situation? Determine which indicators are important to you, such as electricity and water use, and/or employee turn-over rates, then measure them carefully. What efforts have already been undertaken to bring the organization towards sustainability? What ideas do people have about new opportunities that sustainability might open up?
Planning
Nobody can do everything at once, thus priorities must be sorted out. The natural tendency is to focus on the greening of operations (eco-efficiency), and then perhaps some of the social issues facing an organization. But remembering that sustainability can drive innovation, are there obvious redesigns, new products or markets that might be taken advantage of sooner, rather than later?
Reporting
Systematic gathering and reporting of progress towards sustainability can guide future actions, especially when such data is well-anchored by good baseline information. Financial investments, payback periods, and savings associated with sustainability work must be tracked, along with other tangible and indirect costs and benefits. Then everybody involved knows the whole story.
Attain Eco-efficient Cost Savings
Identify energy, water, and waste savings opportunities. Review procurement habits, minimize toxicities, change packaging and shipping patterns. Keep your best employees, reduce insurance costs, establish an information system for wise decision-making, keep ahead of regulation.
Sustainability Drives Innovation
Beyond eco-efficiency, embracing a sustainability mindset encourages people to think of new products, new services, new ways of operating, new markets, and new alliances. Creative collaboration, which emerges in all organizations when they explore sustainability options, can have big payoffs in important innovations.
Coordinate and Capture Your Efforts So Far
Most places are already doing many things right, and have begun to improve other matters in an ad hoc fashion. Usually, however, nobody knows what anybody else is doing, things are not coordinated, and serious opportunities are being missed. Designing a systematic approach to achieving and tracking sustainability will yield greater results, and better information about those results.
The Sustainability Academy has completed full Annual Assessments and Reports for West Marine Company (headquartered in Watsonville, CA) and Hayward Lumber Company (headquartered in Monterey, CA).
Curriculum Design
The Academy offers professional curriculum design and consultation on a wide range of sustainability topics, including agriculture, business, building, water, and climate change.
Hartnell Community College: The Academy is currently designing coursework for the college's Sustainable Construction program, working with Hartnell teachers to add sustainability to their courses.
Interested in adding sustainability to your curriculum? Please contact us.
Customized Classes and Workshops
The Academy offers customized courses, training, short workshops, or lectures on sustainability topics for any size organization. Examples of these classes and workshops include the "Greenbag Lunch" series for the volunteers and employees of the Monterey Bay Aquarium; a lecture for employees of the Community Foundation of Monterey County, a presentation to employees of CTB/McGraw-Hill, and a presentation to employees of the Spa at Pebble Beach.
For information on specialized sustainability presentations for your employees or organization members, pleasecontact us.
Research and Evaluation
The Academy offers research expertise on sustainability topics at any level of analysis - from simple resource identification to background context to problem-solving. Examples of this type of research include the identification and analysis of available e-tools for sustainability assessment at the Monterey Bay Aquarium and criteria development and analysis of a green building product line for Hayward Lumber.
Please contact us to discuss how our expertise can be put to use in your organization.
Speaker Bureau
Information is key in creating a sustainable community. The Sustainability Academy is proud to include a number of gifted public speakers as affiliates of the Academy. These individuals include:
- Jennifer Ramras Sardina (sustainability)
- Rob Nicely (green construction and design)
- Michael Waxer (green architecture and design)
- Joe Jordan (solar energy), Daniel Robin (bio-renewables)
- Sharron Sarris (green building, energy and electric vehicles)
- Lydia Corser (green interiors)
- Jennifer Dassel (sustainable agriculture)
- Laurie Fried (sustainability management)
- Catherine Bowie (water issues)
- Deborah Streeter (interfaith sustainability)
To arrange for a sustainability professional to make a presentation to your group or organization, please contact us.