BOONE, N.C. — On the first Earth Day in 1970, more than 20 million people in the United States attended festivities celebrating our planet, launching a grassroots initiative to respect and protect the environment. This year, global participation in Earth Day activities is expected to exceed 1 billion.
According to the Appalachian State University’s chief sustainability officer, Dr. Lee F. Ball, Appalachian celebrates Earth Day 24/7 year-round. “We instill resilience and agency in our students through intentional curricula, research opportunities and by example at every level. Every day is Earth Day at Appalachian and in the community,” Ball said.
“Our student population is approaching 20,000 — we have come a long way since our 1899 origins as an academy founded to educate the people of rural Western North Carolina,” he said. “We have succeeded because of our resiliency, a shared respect for the bounty of our rivers and our mountain ranges, the dignity of our people and the balance of economies. History has taught us what is required to sustain and thrive.”
To celebrate Earth Month 2019, Appalachian is hosting more than 25 free events during April to promote sustainable practices in people’s lives — environmentally, socially and economically.
This photo gallery highlights a sampling of Appalachian’s recent sustainability initiatives and events.
July 2018 — ROSE, Team Sunergy’s Cruiser Class solar vehicle, at the American Solar Challenge in July. ROSE and Team Sunergy took second place in the challenge. Cruiser is the division for solar cars that could be practical in the real world, owing to seating capacity, range, amenities and speed. This is the second car built by Team Sunergy, Appalachian’s student-led solar vehicle team. Photo by Chase Reynolds
April 2018 — This mobiLANDING, a sheltered workspace located at the university’s Small Wind Research and Demonstration Site on Beech Mountain, was designed and built by Appalachian students. Its features include locally sourced lumber and bifacial solar panels, which power the structure’s lighting and tie back into the electrical grid. The MOBILab, an energy self-sufficient mobile classroom and research station designed and built by students in the IDEXlab (Integrative Design Experience Laboratory), is visible in the background. Photo by Marie Freeman
March 2019 — As part of an Alternative Service Experience, Appalachian students work alongside community partners from the Marine Discovery Center to remove trash and invasive plant species from a local waterway in New Smyrna Beach, Florida. The students learned how to clean a Water Goat — the yellow and orange floating device pictured in the background, which features a net designed to collect trash while allowing fish to swim through. They also helped to organize, sort and track the trash that was pulled out of the water. Photo by Kimberly Adair
June 2018 — Senior sustainable technology major Nikki Cook works on installing a solar streetlamp in Pucarumi, Peru, during a summer study abroad. She was the project manager for the installation. Photo by Marie Freeman
March 2019 — Graduate student scientists test the water quality in Boone Creek, a waterway that travels through Appalachian’s main campus. Plans to daylight the creek are part of a larger resiliency initiative. Photo by Marie Freeman
June 2018 — On top of the Quelccaya Ice Cap in Peru, junior geography major Cole Barrow, bottom right, relays measurements from a snow pit to senior geography major Michael Godwin, far left. With them is John Howarth, center, who played a supporting role during the expedition. Photo by Marie Freeman
June 2018 — Chefs from Appalachian’s Food Services visit the Goodnight Family Department of Sustainable Development’s Teaching and Research Farm in Ashe County and speak to Farm Director Chip Hope, far right. In addition to providing food for the university — Food Services sources 26.86 percent of its food locally — the farm provides opportunity for crop and livestock teaching and research. Photo by Chase Reynolds
October 2018 — Attendees of Community FEaST 2018 gather around a 100-yard continuous table that stretched across Appalachian’s Sanford Mall for an evening of fellowship, food and conversation about sustainable food issues. Photo by Marie Freeman
March 2018 — Apparel design and merchandising students work together to fix a pair of pants as part of Appalachian’s Mending Initiative. The project aims to build an awareness in the Appalachian Community about the importance of maintaining clothing to prevent garments from becoming waste in landfills. Photo by Chase Reynolds
November 2018 — The Assessment, Support and Counseling (ASC) program, spearheaded by Dr. Kurt Michael, assistant chair of Appalachian’s Dr. Wiley F. Smith Department of Psychology and the Aeschleman Distinguished Professor of Psychology, second from right, has been associated with positive outcomes and significant reductions in distress among teens struggling with depression, suicidality, anxiety and the associated academic impairments. The program has become a national model for sustainable, school-based mental health treatment initiatives. ASC Centers operate in three area counties through an interdisciplinary team of school personnel, Appalachian graduate students and Appalachian faculty who, together, discuss each student referral’s issues and needs. Photo by Marie Freeman
September 2018 — The NEXUS project at Appalachian comprises a multidisciplinary team of faculty and students housed in the Department of Sustainable Technology and the Built Environment, whose research lies at the intersection of agriculture energy and natural resources. The project has been developing inexpensive and efficient biomass greenhouse heating technologies that provide affordable and sustainable means to improve food-growing capacities and the standard of living for farming communities in rural Appalachia while reducing the use of fossil fuels. Photo by Marie Freeman
April 2018 — Data and Assessment Specialist Jim Dees, in Appalachian’s Office of Sustainability, right, shows visitors from Kurdistan, Iraq, a mobile app that is the monitoring interface for output on the renewables systems on campus. The visitors were taking a campus tour of Appalachian’s sustainability initiatives. Photo by Mare Freeman
August 2018 — The university-managed Rise Market + Bakery, located in Appalachian’s Leon Levine Hall of Health Sciences, provides carefully created meals and experiences that enable students, faculty and staff to rise to the top of their field while supporting local partners through intentional sourcing. Photo by Marie Freeman
November 2018 — Appalachian inspires students to be lifelong advocates of sustainable practices. Fifth-grade science teacher Ashley Carlton ’12 poses on the grounds of an elementary school in Lenoir, with a solar panel visible in the background. Carlton co-wrote the grant application for the solar panel project. Photo by Chase Reynolds
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About Sustainability at Appalachian
Appalachian State University’s leadership in sustainability is known nationally. The university’s holistic, three-branched approach considers sustainability economically, environmentally and equitably in relationship to the planet’s co-inhabitants. The university is an active steward of the state’s interconnected financial, cultural and natural resources and challenges students and others think critically and creatively about sustainability and what it means from the smallest individual action to the most broad-based applications. The university offers both undergraduate and graduate academic degree programs that focus on sustainability. In addition, 100 percent of Appalachian’s academic departments offer at least one sustainability course or course that includes sustainability, and all students graduate from programs that have adopted at least one sustainability learning outcome. Learn more at https://appstate.edu/sustainability.
About Appalachian State University
As the premier public undergraduate institution in the Southeast, Appalachian State University prepares students to lead purposeful lives as global citizens who understand and engage their responsibilities in creating a sustainable future for all. The Appalachian Experience promotes a spirit of inclusion that brings people together in inspiring ways to acquire and create knowledge, to grow holistically, to act with passion and determination, and to embrace diversity and difference. Located in the Blue Ridge Mountains, Appalachian is one of 17 campuses in the University of North Carolina System. Appalachian enrolls nearly 21,000 students, has a low student-to-faculty ratio and offers more than 150 undergraduate and graduate majors.
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