ON CAMPUS
6
WINTER 2012 | ST. LAWRENCE UNIVERSITY MAGAZINE
With the inauguration of Almon Gunnison, first
president to preside over both the Theological
School and the College of Letters and Science,
St. Lawrence becomes a true university
.
Students begin publishing
The Hill News
.
The first
Candlelight
Service
is held.
Phi Beta Kappa
is installed on campus
and performs its first induction.
1899
1911
1921
The U.S. enters
World War I.
1917
Students were surprised one day last
fall to find what looked like a gas-guz-
zling sports car parked in front of the
Sullivan Student Center, especially dur-
ing a week of environmental awareness.
The Tesla Roadster, however, fit right
in: It was an electric vehicle on display
as part of a climate change forum.
“
As an environmental studies major, I
was excited to see that energy efficiency
does not have to compromise luxury or
design,” said Matt Gilbert ’13.
The forum also featured the eruption
of chirps and peeps in the Winston
Room just before a lecture by ABC
News’ Bill Blakemore. Confused faces
attempted to find the source of the
avian flash mob, which was not the
result of an open window on the third
floor, but rather an organized collabora-
tive effort among dozens of students
and Peter Nelson, a visiting photogra-
phy professor.
“
The whole thing was a blast,” said
Eliza Cress ’13. She explained that
Nelson wanted to engage his students
creatively but in a low-impact way, and
they came up with the idea of having
students use only their voices to morph
the space into a chorus of birds.
During more serious moments,
speakers addressed scientific evidence of
climate change, what individuals can do
to counter the change, and a disinfor-
mation campaign aimed at discrediting
it. Workshops tackled environmental
initiatives, enforcement and careers;
among the leaders were John R. “Jeff ”
Cook ’70, Hal Thomas ’74 and Jack
Whittier ’75.
“
With graduation approaching, it was
refreshing to see how many jobs in the
environmental field there are and how
different each one is from the next,” said
Sumner Ford ’13. For more, visit www.
stlawu.edu/green/node/786.
Information Technology staff are doing
their part for the environment. They’re
not only getting around campus faster
and more efficiently these days, they're
also getting around greener.
IT has replaced two gasoline-powered
mini-vans with two bicycles and two
electric golf carts. “We’re really excited
that we have found alternatives that
align with our goal of being as envi-
ronmentally sustainable as possible,”
Student Services Coordinator Steve
Millington ’07 said.
The department’s commitment to
sustainability extends beyond ve-
hicles. Requests for proposals from the
department state that vendors must
demonstrate a commitment to environ-
mental sustainability in manufacturing,
shipping, energy consumption and use
of recycled materials. Vendors must also
certify that, if they recycle old and used
computer equipment, they do so in
accordance with the Resource Conserva-
tion Recovery Act (RCRA) for hazard-
ous waste. —Allison Shea ’13 and MD
A Green Car in
More Ways Than One