Welcome to the Penn Environmental Group!
The University of Pennsylvania Environmental Group is a student run group aiming to increase campus awareness of global environmental issues across the Penn community and throughout the world. The Group seeks to incorporate ideals from a diverse community, and expose the campus, community and the world at large to an expanded knowledge of environmental issues.

Announcements

Recycle Mania is underway!

Spring 2009 Meetings:

Our third general body meeting for Spring 2009 is on Monday March 23rd at 8:00 in the Civic House!

What we do

We have a general body meeting once a month and smaller teams meet every week. To join a team please attend a meeting or e-mail a team leader. Teams include:

  • TRUTH/Awareness:
    Monday at 5pm in Upper Lobby Rodin
    TRUTH/Awareness group works to heighten our student body's environmental awareness through "guerilla environmentalism". This semester we hope to have a few speakers, movie screenings, and bi monthly installations on college green (like the bottled water one in the fall). For more information: Noah Aptekar (noah.aptekar@gmail.com), Bob Goldman (goldmanh@sas.upenn.edu)

  • RecycleMania:
    Mondays at 7pm in the Board Room of Hill College House
    A 10-week-long competition between college recycling programs in the U.S. and Canada to see which institution can have the highest recycling rate. Help us spread awareness about Penn recycling and reach our goal of recycling 30% of our waste. We will be working on putting up Green Footprints around campus, organizing special events, and participating in other activities (check our the mural we painted outside 1920 Commons!). For a more information, please visit the projects page, visit www.upenn.edu/recyclemania or join the "UPenn Recyclemania" Facebook event. To contact: Ashley Templeton (atempleton11@gmail.com), Abby Waldorf (awaldorf@sas.upenn.edu), and Ashima Sukhdev (asukhdev@sas.upenn.edu)

  • Student Outreach, Marketing, and Communications (SOMC):
    Tuesdays at 9 pm in Upper Lobby Rodin (no meeting week of 3/1)
    SOMC has the important job of informing the student community about important environmental issues, as well as events that PEG is involved with. We do everything from creating facebook groups, chalking Locust Walk, and designing advertisements for events to more in depth projects. This semester we hope to design and research for environmental awareness posters (to be placed all around campus), design awesome PEG t-shirts, and write and create a "Green Times" insert for the DP! To contact: Jenna Stahl and Sigrid Luhr (jenstahl@sas.upenn.edu, luhrs@sas.upenn.edu)

  • Education Team:
    Sundays at 9:15 pm in Upper Lobby Harrison
    The education team works with elementary to high school students in West Philadelphia to teach them about sustainability, recycling and the environment. This semester we are looking to expand to new schools and after school programs and to develop more curricula to use with the students. Our meetings are tons of fun since we get to be super creative and who doesn't love to hang out with cute kids? To contact: Hannah Connor (hannah.connor@gmail.com) or Leah Abrams (ljabrams@sas.upenn.edu).

  • Social:
    Wednesday 8pm at the Civic House
    The Social Squad is dedicated to spreading awareness about how environmentalism can be a part of all parts of your life - your social life included. We work to ensure the new members of PEG - especially freshmen - have lots of opportunities to meet other PEG members and spearhead their own initiatives. We organize parties, potluck dinners, field trips (apple picking is becoming an annual adventure) and fundraisers. To contact: Jessica Goldstein (gjessica@sas.upenn.edu)

  • Local Action Committee:
    Wednesday 7pm Civic House
    Currently we have projects involving composting at University City High School, starting a pilot program for composting in on-campus residences, reducing use of plastic bags in and around campus, and working with Penn Dining to make the dining halls more environmentally-friendly. We would love new members who either want to see these ideas put into action or have new ideas that involve the surrounding area. Kevin Levy (levykm@sas.upenn.edu), Courtney Kozlowski (kozlowsk@sas.upenn.edu)

  • Greening PCR :
    Ever wonder why your papers must be turned in double-spaced or single-sided, or why your teacher insisted on printing out every little thing she wanted the class to see? PEG will hopefully work with PCR to encourage teachers to commit to certain objective standards of environmental practice by working to get a mark placed aside a teacher's name on PCR indicating their level of environmental commitment. If you are interested in reducing Penn's paper trail, get in touch with Maddie Macks. (maddiemacks@gmail.com).

  • Green Acorn:
    In order to encourage local food carts, restaurants and other businesses to engage in sustainable behavior we are planning to put together an environmental seal (a green acorn) to mark commercial partners who meet certain standards for environmental excellence. To get involved, e-mail Maya Tepler (tepler@sas.upenn.edu),

  • Energy Team:
    This new initiative aims to help reduce the amount of energy used on campus by students and staff. Ideas include having everyone sign a pledge to save energy, reducing the amount of lights that are perpetually left on around campus, and talking directly to students to educate them on how to incorporate energy saving habits into their normal routine. If you would like to help out, please contact Leah (ljabrams@sas.upenn.edu) or Sigrid (luhrs@sas.upenn.edu)