17-20.11.2016 – Amsterdam, collection of notes from all workshops and keynotes

The 3rd European GO Summit 2016 convened over 90 students and staff from 20 Green Offices (GO) /

Sustainability Hubs, 10 GO initiatives and four partner organisations from six European countries. In this

document, you can read all the notes of the major workshops and keynotes. The notes act as a supplement to

the presentation slides that are available for some workshops.

Many thanks to the great note takers: Anki, Femke, Shanice, Luna, Lotte, Neele, Hanna, Talia, Anselm, Giorgia,

Tim, Felix

Track 1: Sustainability .......................................................................................................................................... 3

1. Renewable energy and energy efficiency (Dr P.J.H. van Beukering) ........................................................... 3

2. Waste (RAI Amsterdam) .............................................................................................................................. 7

3. Food (Prof Dr J.W. Erisman) ....................................................................................................................... 10

3. Climate change (Prof P.H. Pattberg) .......................................................................................................... 11

Track 2: Professionalization ............................................................................................................................... 14

1. How to sell sustainability? (vandebron) .................................................................................................... 14

2. Behavioural change (Maverick) ................................................................................................................. 16

3. Sustainable Transitions (IM^2 Solutions) .................................................................................................. 17

5.Networking (Deloitte) ................................................................................................................................. 20

Track 3: GO Portfolios ........................................................................................................................................ 23

1. Education and research ............................................................................................................................. 23

2. Operations ................................................................................................................................................. 25

3. Community ................................................................................................................................................. 27

4. Internal organisation .................................................................................................................................. 30

Track 4: Movement ........................................................................................................................................... 32

1. Vision for the Movement ........................................................................................................................... 32

2. Designing and lobbying for GOs ................................................................................................................. 36

3. Governance and membership ................................................................................................................... 39

4. Action plan for collaboration ..................................................................................................................... 42

Keynotes ............................................................................................................................................................ 47

1. World Merit (Zita Luiten) ........................................................................................................................... 47

2. Dopper (Jens Kok) ...................................................................................................................................... 48

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Aim of the workshop:

1. Identify measures that lead to CO2 reductions.

2. Set up an evaluation. Which are the criteria that we should consider when we rank options to make this

happen?

3. How do we score these criteria?

4. How do we combine these multiple criteria into 1 final decision?

Step 1: Identify the measures that you can take to improve energy performance

Successes of energy improvement/greenhouse gas reduction in own university:

- Behavioral changes (switching of the light/beamer etc.)

- Investments in buildings to save energy (e.g. better isolation). The money that is saved is invested in

sustainability again.

- Education: behavioral campaigns are possible by giving out rewards to the most sustainable solutions,

these kinds of incentives.

- Or a system where you don’t have to pay taxes for sustainable purchases (e.g. bicycles).

Two main categories of changes:

1. Behavioral changes

2. Physical changes

Behavioral measures:

- Employee’s campaign. Smart campaign, through all kinds of communication employees get more aware

of their energy use and how to reduce this. For example: stickers at their windows that remind them of

taking certain actions.

- App for sustainability: social network platform with a reward system. You take photos of sustainable

behavior. By doing this, you can earn credits that you can use to ‘win’ sustainable prizes.

Physical measures:

- Solar panels

- Double glass windows

Step 2: Different criteria to evaluate the measures

4 main criteria to evaluate sustainability measures:

1. Financial effects

2. Environmental effects

3. Social effects

4. Institutional effects

Sub criteria:

- Public support of the measure

o It’s easier to make people turn of the light, whilst it’s more difficult to encourage them to eat less

meat. This should be considered.

- Evidence based research/proven concept

o Is there evidence from the past that proves us that it works?

o Does it reduce CO2 emissions?

- Money

o Upfront costs

o Cost effectiveness

- Size of the impact

o Environmental impact: CO2 reduction or energy reduction

- Feasibility

o Institutional complexity

o Administrative costs

- Resource demand (cost recovery)

- Indirect effects

Step 3: score these criteria.

- Rank the measures (from step 1) based on the four main criteria (from step 2). The plusses and minuses

are based on intuition.

Step 4: Conduct a multi-criteria analysis.

- Ranking system: 4 most important, 1 least important.

- Every individual of the group will rank the four categories below based on their opinion, the number after

the category is the sum of all the scores.

- Combine this ranking with the ranking from step 3 to create the figures below.

Sum of scores:

Financial: 36

Environmental: 48

Social: 27

Institutional: 28

Based on the figures in step 4 we can conclude that the social media

program is overall a good intervention. It has the highest overall score for all the criteria.

We identified all the possible measures. Matthew indicated that there could be measures that could have

much more impact. We should also look at the bigger picture and see how we could make some more

structural changes.

The effects table were just entered through plusses and minuses, based in intuition and not on evidence based

research. It’s good to have this discussion also with your own board. Make them aware that it’s not just about

finances even though money is a very powerful weapon. It may be that for some of the results, you are very

confident whilst for the others there’s more uncertainty.

Introduction

- RAI is biggest exhibition centre in NL

- After every fair large amount of waste left

- Approach: see value in waste

CSR Policy

- For 10 years: CSR policy incl. waste, energy, people-planet-profit approach

- 2016 new: stimulate sustainability, networking; reduce goals to few focus points:

o People: social return (programme for young people with disabilities, tackle unemployment

(especially young people))

o Planet: CO2 neutral, zero waste, sustainable range of products (min. x% of products sustainable,

x depends on kind of product)

o Progress: organise meaningful events (RAI-owned exhibitions) = require every exhibition to have

an InnovationLAB

Generated waste

- 450 – 500 events per year which create 90% of RAI’s total waste (70% by exhibitioners)

- Zero waste goal: go further

Organisation of waste management

- 3.160t of waste per year go to Icova (waste company) = outsourced: some of Icova staff based at RAI

(administration, environmental regulation)

- Environmental inspectors who check waste and advise exhibitioners during event, control waste

separation

- Pay if you leave your waste behind (incl. caterers), can’t oblige them to leave it at RAI, common to pay for

leaving waste

- As much separation, as possible on site (KSP, not common amongst Conference Centres)

Waste per events

- 100 events responsible for 80% of total business per year

- Waste plan of action for every event (kind of waste, materials, audience addressed (public: samples given))

- Solutions for waste management offered: containers for different kinds of waste and volumes

- Sold as a profitable product: revenue 1 million Euros per year, sold before exhibition

- Waste production: 30% during set up, 30% during event (catering, merchandise), 40% post event

- Exhibitioners ask for environmental characteristics, ask for support to meet their own sustainable goals,

also involved in sustainability and decreasing their impact on the environment

Waste transport

- Separation on site > more compacted waste > more efficient transport

- Waste transport via Amsterdam’s canals (electric boat, specific container) > waste company situated at

canal

- 10.000l underground tank for organic waste on site (esp. for catering) > emptied by Icova

RAI Amsterdam > movie the great switch

- Tasks: what kinds of waste do you see

- Carpet, paper, carton, old stands

- Slide waste types 2015: left half of figure is separated at site (20% wood, solution needed), other half

brought to Icova as generic waste (becomes pellet = new product = 100% recycled (used as burning

material and sold to industry), fluids, metals, organic)

- Slide 100% recycling into reusable materials and products

Zero waste

Different definitions

- UK: zero landfill, to reduce it UK brings waste to NL and other countries where it is burnt, NL has

overcapacity in waste burning factories

- Create no waste

- 100% recycling, now next step

Circular economy to zero expedition

- Logistics & technique: transport (+compaction at RAI site, speed docking (truck leaves when it is full),

+waste transported by electric boat), smarter hardware on site, digital ordering of containers

- Manpower: training of cleaning staff (often not informed about waste policies and regulations), zero waste

labs (teaching about waste), efficient planning of resources, awareness and raising knowledge among RAI

staff > increase quality

- Circular economy: 100% recycling or reuse

Future challenge

- After 100% recycling > circular economy

- Now: waste generator (RAI, exhibitioners) > RAI complex > 50% separated > Icova > industry = recycle

- Future: waste generator > RAI complex > 70% separated waste > Icova transport > production process (re-

use/recycle) > new products > waste generator

- New destinations: old envelopes reused as notebooks, organic waste into returned energy, old uniforms

into second hand uniforms > ideas, be creative, think innovative

Still looking for solutions:

- Invest in in-house composting machine to decrease transport

o Organic waste > 24h > 100kg waste become 15kg of composted waste

o Make own circle

- Cardboard recycled > reboard (strong cardboard building material for stands), can be recycled easily (new

product)

o Difficult: convince companies to use cardboard to receive cardboard for recycling

- Wood solutions: left behind, solution needed!

- Paper to paper

o Coffee cups: often with coating, therefore recycling impossible > solution needed!

o Paper towels

o Printed paper: how to reuse it? Solution needed!

- Recycle logo: what object has been before + RAI logo > raise awareness and inform

Tasks: what is your zero-waste expedition?

- Biodegradable cups

- Biodegradable cigarette filters

- seeds into degradable (composting paper > plant grows)

- edible glass and plates

- coffee powder to grow mushrooms

- clothes recycling (systemic office Italy), NL: make new cotton, new RAI uniform maybe made from that,

bring old clothes back

- food sharing (supermarkets): RAI looking for cooperation with Dutch Voedselbank

o problem: NL strict regulations of food security

- swap system: exchange item with something

- wood: offer stands for companies, modular building

- refurbished: repair furniture to reuse them

o provides carpentry schools with leftover wood

- glass containers: use them as storage

- glass bottles: for flowers, as lights

- paper as scrap paper

- shoe boxes as gift box

- bike tyre as belt

- furniture: window made a table > reuse

- plastic bag/wrapping material as garbage bags

Key to success?

- Risk, try before you die

- Transparent cooperation with waste company, open relationship

- Knowledge about processes and figures

- Be patient and take your time

- Science - mostly focused on zooming in, but we need to zoom out and look at the bigger picture. Also for

the food system - Important-soil important for food system. System approach is what we need with food and nitrogen - Food production contributes to the exceedance of planetary boundaries - nitrogen + biodiversity loss - We need nitrogen, for food production. Nitrogen is made by natural processes and human made

processes - Human population after WW2 boosted agriculture - population growth. 48% of the global population is

fed because of fertilizer. However, uneven distribution - Average daily requirement is exceeded - Challenge in relation to human health - food and food consumption - Efficiency in nitrogen- meat is way less efficient. 100 kg fertilizer:4kg food - Nitrogen efficiency: 10-50% - To much nitrogen: smog, forest die back, acidification, ozone, global warming, eutrophication - fish die-

back - Balance between benefits and drawbacks - Footprints - overstepping ourselves - Nitrogen food utilities and consumption - Food choices with foodprint - personal footprint - meat makes a lot more losses. - Can calculate your own footprint - Problem: nitrogen is always lost. How do we solve this? - Institutions: university footprints - First is going to be of the VU - Focus on amount of protein that you need in your food choices - Meat consumption should reduce, people should eat less

Introduction

- 1992 Climate Convention, UNFCCC

- 1994 Kyoto protocol: only legally binding protocol,

they agreed upon a reduce in emission.

- Main idea: some countries take more responsibility

than others (developing vs. developed countries).

- But in the meantime, a lot have changed in the world.

A lot of developing countries have now changed into

major economical transitions.

- You cannot fix the problem without the major

emitters (without China for example there is nothing

we can change).

- Change: from top-down perspective to bottom-up.>

this new approach brings in everyone, but we are

going to discuss if that is enough.

- In Paris agreements: countries themselves will tell

what they will reduce in emissions. Problem: maybe

that is not enough.

- New problem: Trump. Took years to get the US on

board and now Trump said he is out of the

agreement.

You can’t see the political agreements like UNFCCC back in the graphic.

- UNFCC goal: wants to achieve stabilization of concentration of GHG in the atmosphere for a level that is

not dangerous for us. What is dangerous is not defined. UNFCC wanted to stabilize it. But the graphic

shows it didn’t.

- IPCC: scientific revue body: global warming is human made (from 50% in 1992 to 99,5% now). Nowadays

it is not theoretical anymore but is here now.

problems of climate change

- See level rise

- Desertification

- Intensification of weather

- Impacts eco-systems

- Acidification

The people who caused it, are also the ones who won’t feel that much of climate change. For example, for NL

living below see-level is different than in Bangladesh. Major impacts are felt somewhere else.

What has been achieved?

- Climate change is now something what is mainstream, not a lot of believe are aware of the fact climate

change is real.

Milestones

- 1979: World Climate Conference: climate change (only a little bit) can lead to major issues in civilization.

We owe our stability basically to the climate surrounding us.

- 1988: IPCC founded, the scientific body. The reports they write are reviewed by governments line by line.

Governments agree on the content.

- 1989: Nordwijk meeting. Environmental ministers, they came up with the idea to organise an international

conference

- 1992: UNFCCC: stabilize GHG in the atmosphere. A framework convention is established

- 1997: Kyoto Protocol. Legally binding agreement. Reduce emissions 5.2%. only the Annex I countries (rich

ones), the others in annex II don’t (63). Common But differentiated responsibility (CBDR).

- 2001: Marrakech Accords

- 2005: Kyoto Protocol entered into force. Russia was missing.

- 2007: Bali roadmap. Implementation period of Kyoto was almost over.

- 2009: Copenhagen summit. Was supposed to be a Kyoto II. But nothing happened in Copenhagen. India,

Brazil, China and Russia (BRICs) didn’t accept.

- In between: meeting, meeting, meeting in nice places.

- 2015: Paris Summit. New idea: what are you willing to do as a country? INDC process. What is your plan

on climate? Radically different approach. But now all the countries have taken some responsibility for the

problem. The fast-growing countries are now on board as well.

Stagnation: failure of Copenhagen: > major disappointment

- Changed geo-political landscape

- Economic crisis

- Leadership crisis: Obama wasn’t a strong leader in climate for a long time (because of the climate deniers

in the congress). Leadership crisis led to an accord. EU wasn’t part of this discussion.

Cumulative CO2 emissions

- US and EU are responsible for 50% of the emissions. But the other countries need to come aboard as well.

“We ate the cake” > that is not fair.

- Solutions: offer compensation. Money on the table in the negotiations

Changes

2012-2015: emergence of new paradigm:

1. From top-down to bottom-up: Kyoto was based on negotiated shared emission reduction commitments.

The post-Copenhagen agenda is based on a bottom-up architecture in form of NDCs (intended) Nationally

Determined Contributions

2. Beyond mitigation: the current negotiations include a wide range of detailed and interlinked topics. Also,

the number of topics increased: Financing, adaptation, technology transfer, loss and damage, capacity

building, global stock-tacking

3. Beyond public actors: Up until now it was a governmental thing, but that might not be enough. The

renewed climate regime incudes a wide range factors beyond governments. For example: regions like

California, non-state actors like cities (Amsterdam), companies and NGOs, faith-based organizations,

indigenous groups

4. Beyond climate: The emphasis is much more on the additional positive impacts of transitioning towards a

zero-carbon society (co-benefits).

Paris Agreement

- It commits states to do something. Specific agreement per article > in the slides of the PowerPoint.

- Ambition: 2 degrees warming is made into international law (Art 2)

- Start low but there is a periodic review, and they can put additional on the table. > ambitions are being

updated every 5 years.

- No enforcement capacity: that’s is why the states are still negotiating (in cop 22 etc.)

- NDCs would lead to 2.7 degrees warming by 2100 (compared to 3.6 at current policies)

- Current pledges reduce by 0.9 degrees, assuming full implementation. Ambition gap remains! (also before

2020)

Challenges

- Post-factual democracy: politicians win by getting feelings right and facts wrong.

Marrakech COP 22:

- implementation Paris agreements

- Outcomes:

o Proclamation document: Paris in irrevocable

o Vulnerable coalition: “we will face out fossil fuel by 2050”> powerful signal

o Global climate action agenda: cities, regions, NGOs, individuals. Reinforced as a major power

because of the gap we just discussed. Possibilities: education!!!

Introduction

What do you think of when you think of selling sustainability? What are your expectations?

- How to approach different people?

- How to convince people to buy sustainable products?

- How to sell a sustainable idea instead of a product?

- How can we convince people to join the sustainability organization instead of them choosing a sports

association or a party association?

What is vandebron and why did we get so successful?

If you don’t know how to sell something you can’t make it successful. Sales is selling an idea and selling a

party, selling yourself to convince others to join you.

The Netherlands is at the bottom of Europe when it comes to renewable energy, we are in a very bad

situation and are very slow in the process, because people think that they buy green energy, but in fact

they are buying normal energy because of greenwashing.

Vandebron makes use of unused land or space of people who could generate green energy. They kick-

started the company and because one of the owners already had a sales background they got many people

excited about what they do and the start-up process happened very quickly.

In the Netherlands, we generate much energy through wind energy, customers can choose their own

farmer that generates energy. The company works with a monthly fee; customers can have a membership

for small fees a month. We grew from 5 to >80 local producers, we think that we will get 100.000

households today. We’re the fastest growing utility company of the Netherlands and have over 90

employees now.

What are some questions that you have about vandebron?

It’s very expensive to install wind turbines, do the farmers buy and install them themselves?

o Yes, but they get help from investors. We didn’t want to get involved with the investment, because

then we wouldn’t be independent parties anymore.

Are you planning to expand to different countries?

o Yes, thinking of UK now, they have similar weather conditions and the UK also needs a kick start

on renewable energy.

Workshop

Sales has a bad reputation, but it doesn’t have to be like that. You can sell things in a fun way and convince

others to do good.

50% of the world population is aged under 30, so we are the people who must change the world. Sales is

part of this.

Start with the WHY for example: for all the people who buy renewable energy in the NL, only half of them

get renewable energy (greenwashing).

Make this WHY specific and make it convincing

Put some numbers in it (more than half of…)

Tell a story.

Sales pitch: (AIDA – model)

- Attention: Draw people’s attention, explain the WHY. The WHY of sustainability is big, that’s why I think

it’s quite easy to sell.

- Interest: Create an interest. Tell your story, tell about what you do.

- Desire: Create desire, tell what your Unique Selling Point is. What makes you different. You don’t want

people to join because they feel bad for you, the product should benefit them as well.

- Action: The most important step, but also the most difficult step. Call to action NOW. “Do it now, because

the Netherlands can get better on the ranking list and we can get closer to a sustainable country”.

- Your tone of voice and your body language is more important than your story. Your voice is your most

important sales tool (look at video: How to sound smart in your TedTalk). Use hand gestures to make

statements. First make people listen.

Different target groups:

- Green groups: focus on saving the world

- Farmer groups: focus on how you can benefit the farmers

Highlight the more important parts that are attractive to that group. There are different aspects of one story.

Questions

- ?: If we talk about the WHY it seems to be very negative and I don’t feel like that’s motivating for people

who are not in the topic of sustainability. It is hard to convince people to buy certain products if they don’t

think about sustainability. We don’t want to point fingers.

o What we do is that we are trying to make our product fun. There are always more parts of a story.

When we make a commercial we always start with a picture of happy farmers to create a good

feeling. Don’t be too negative. The WHY can also be told in a fun way. Make some jokes and show

the fun part and show the benefits.

- ?: What if you have a bad voice?

o I think everybody can give good presentations if you practice. If your voice is bad just make some

jokes or give funny comments about your voice, so people will still listen to it. People who work

in sustainability almost beg people to join, but we need to be convincing.

- ?: Do I pay attention to what I wear? I’m wearing a red scarf, so it might distract people.

o If you have the feeling it would distract people, it will show in your body language. Dress in a way

that makes you most confident. Be yourself, that’s most important.

- ?: Yesterday someone tried to sell me something and I mentioned that he wasn’t interested.

o You need to be motivated and truly interested in the product. If you are not, then don’t sell it. You

need to be motivated and believe in the product, because else you won’t sell and you won’t trigger

people to buy it. If you’re motivated and you FEEL the product then you don’t even need the AIDA

model to sell something.

- ?: What if you’re not on the street, but on a skype call?

o We realized when we were having a skype call we were losing someone’s interest. Make a turn in

the conversation. Use an open question to get back to someone’s comfort zone and then return

to your own story.

- ?: Like what kind of question?

o Come up with a question that’s in line with what you’re discussing and ask him/her about his/her

own opinion, the energy levels are up again and then you can start with your own topic again.

- ?: What are tricks to remind yourself to slow down?

o When you come to the technical/practical stuff (the HOW) you should slow down with talking, so

people can follow you. At the end, you should be enthusiastic again to make people interested

and inspire them. People won’t follow you when you talk business you should slow down so

people take you seriously and always back up your story.

Goal: Change with societal value, in sustainability, safety & mobility Theory - Ways of processing - shortcuts, efficient way to process information - Gap between what we say and what we do - because our brain moves on consciously - Measure behavior - never measure through surveys Most valuable ways to change behavior: - commitment and consistency

o Billboard example - people who put the sign in their front yard, o commit to a certain goal - they want to be consistent. urge to be consistent. People want to do

what they have always done. - Social norm

o Moral message - everyone does something, so other people do so to.

- Confusion o “Keep your coins, I want change”. Experiment - door to door if they want to buy some Christmas

cards. 3 euro or 300 cents. Moment of confusion people don’t thing straight and people are more easy to persuade. Sold twice as much cards.

- Problem: people don’t want to change their behavior – resistance - How do you solve this? - Example – burger – 25% fat vs 75% lean. Way that you present facts is of great importance. - - Door-in-the-face – way information is framed influences results. From big to concession. Nudging and conscious change goes hand in hand. Question – is there a gender barrier?

- No – brain is an efficient and universal organ

- Also – you cannot influence people to be more sustainable at once.

Case studies:

- Waste separation

- Use stairs vs elevators

- Motivate people to go to the meetings

Case study outcome

Waste separation

- 2 answers: to make it simple for them. Doing without much work will make it more easy.

- Also, social norm – sings to inspire people to join the separation.

- Realize: when people see plastics in the paper bin – other people do that too. Solution: shaped bins or

stickers to help people see what they should throw where.

- Also – separating isn’t useful. Solution to be more transparent in providing information.

- Also - Don’t make people feel obliged,

Stairs

- Provide information to stimulate them – focus on the healthy part even if it is about energy.

More people to come to meetings

- Ideas: food to come to meetings – persuade people with free food. Use the door in the face technique.

- Adapting the way, the event is presented – reframe it, so the focus is not more only on sustainability. Offer

alternatives if people say no. Create membership card – discounts if you are a volunteer. Create

momentum for people to act now & here

Nudging and awareness

- Focus on the group that is aware but not completely active. Focus nudging on the people commitment

and consistency

Changing times

- Big shifts now: election of Trump and smaller movements. For example: occupation of the Maagdenhuis

(building of university of Amsterdam).

- Students wanted to take the power back and take responsibility. Another example of localisation is the

VandeBron energy company, a local renewable company. Localisation, we can also see this happen at the

VU.

Development on the VU

- What transitions can we identify?

o A transition in responsibility: We have a Green office, that is great. But there is a shift of

responsibility, this can be a danger

- How to use these developments?

o How can we turn this around into a positive effect? GO should only be a platform to catalyse the

process but is not responsible, this is a task for the board of the uni.

- Make it concrete?

o The GO can be in the middle of the three fields: education & research, services and students. From

every field, there are going to be a few taking the lead. Together they will form a community. They

will feel the responsibility and it is not about top-down anymore but bottom-up. This will result in

a change of attitude. The GO will position themselves centrally and connect the different interests,

but will not the only one responsible.

World Café

What transitions/developments

can we identify?

How to use these developments for your GO?

- Uni governance: from top-down to dialogues. - GO can be the facilitator and set up meetings

with the key persons (interested people)

- New funding opportunities, e.g. Green Climate

Fund

- Make use of them

- Growing awareness about sustainability - Jump on the moving train

- Right-wing populism - Keep an eye on it. Can be harmful for any

sustainability or social responsibility efforts

- Sustainable Development Goals - Provide legitimacy and a framework for action

- Greenwashing of university - Make this transparent and visible

- Getting outdated - Being one step ahead with your vision

- Team change / continuity - Keep people if possible

- Students are younger and have less time - Shorter times of engagement through projects

- More student associations and students

interested in sustainability

- Have them as ambassadors for your GO

Potential downsides and risks to be considered

- petitions bases? A lot of students are not going to vote. So, this will fail. And why would somebody be an

ambassador? Lack of student participation. But students can still be inspired although a lot of students

don’t give a shit.

- who is going to pay for the cheap healthy food? Globalism: co2 pollution of travelling by plane. Mandate:

sustainability as a right for the GO? Isn’t that a mistake/danger that we mentioned earlier> other will feel

less imposed to act on it. But mandate also means that the GO can do more. Mandate doesn’t mean the

GO always says the right thing.

- why part of administration? Than we are taking more seriously. More legitimacy.

- Critical independent? Combine each other, student associations are independent and they combine the

staff and the associations.

- How are you going to make sure there is no green-washing? A GO can put a pressure on the Uni.

Similarities in hurdles

- Communicate to everybody: even our own director doesn’t know everything. So, it is hard to communicate

t everyone

- Hard to get volunteers

- To deal with people who are not interested in sustainability

What would you like to take out of this workshop?

- Networking basics, concept, skills

- Comfortable in networking

- Presenting yourself offline and online

- Sustain network

- How to get attention or commitment and DONTS

- Professionalization

- Getting to know the tactics

- Conversation starters

- How to make yourself be heard

- Struggles in wanting something from a person

Theory behind networking

- Maintain relationships

- How to approach people you only met once

Step 1 - Who am I?

- Find someone you didn’t know before: what do you like about networking?

- Find a new group of 4. What are you good at? General qualities about yourself.

- How did it go in every group?

- Group 1: opposites, a lot of different qualities

- Group 2: do we like networking? Not per se, meeting new people is nice though. It would be nice to feel

more equal in networking

- Group 3: positive points on networking: inspiration about what you like, helping, connecting. Everybody

likes helping.

- Group 4: networking is goods for connecting with people and getting inspiration

- new groups of 8: 3 groups. Ask: what can you contribute?

- How was it?

- Group 1: a bit hard, we don’t want to sell ourselves. Strategy is also difficult. How can you remain

authentic?

- Group 2: self-love is very important

- Group 3: conversation was quite easy - reflected also have we ever used it before. Nobody felt bad

Facilitator: Women often have problems selling themselves - they are too hesitant even though well

qualified - positive words in conversation - positive inquiry, talk about passions. Makes the conversation very

easy. Personal connections. Appreciative inquiry

Step 2 - networking situations

Looked at who am I first - you need to know yourself first

Difficult situations:

- Networking in a new language

- Networking with new person - how to make personal connections

- Be heard as a young woman

- How do you get your connections to the next step? Ask people?

- How to connect at big events?

GROW method

- 1 what is your goal

- 2 what is your reality

- 3 what is your opportunity

- 4 what is your way forward

Tips & tricks

- Busy network event, get attention

- Goal to get attention

- Reality - person is occupied

- Opportunities - ask for their business card! Be proactive

- join them at the buffet or bar and make contact

- Way forward - have own business card

- Interrupt, but not too impolite

- Simple eye contact, make a situation where you could facilitate

Situation - Hierarchy & ask for help

- Goal: ask for help from professor

- Reality - person might not value you

- Opportunities - Solutions: face to face contact

- Make yourself bigger, more voices

- Way forward - set up strategy beforehand

- Why is it better for them? Make that clear

Goal: getting an internship from the summit

- Reality: its busy, not always possible to make contact

- Not everyone is useful

- Opportunities: many people with networks, it’s easy to approach everyone

- Many people have been in e same situation

- Way forward: Approach people and get courage

Tips:

- be open

- Be sincere

- Be authentic

- Be interested, not interesting - remember people with similar passions

- What are your qualities and how are you different? Practice - there is much competition

- Know what your goal is, be open about it, be specific

- Act and follow up

Challenge lab at Chalmers University

- What?

o The challenge lab is a curricular program open to all master students. Course based

o 14 students (9 different countries)

o Third year programme

o Preparatory course for the challenge lab: leadership for sustainability processes.

Developing criteria per the four pillars

Environmental constraints – planetary boundaries

Wellbeing: quality of life

Economy from a resource distribution perspective

Social: what kind of institutions are there. How to live with everyone together in

a fair and just way

Developing research questions based on the criteria

- Purpose: empowering students to become change agents for transition. Students are not attached to any

organisation and will spread out afterwards.

- Theory of change:

o Sustainability challenges are characterised by high complexity –> wicked problems – how to foster

more collaboration and come together?

o Current dominant theories of change: think out of the box and push. Demand driven innovation

of change (linear) <-> the challenge lab has an alternative view:

o Look at the socio-technical systems with all its compounds: social, technical, political, economic,

juridical, …

o Multi-level perspective (niche theory), niches, regimes, windows of opportunity. Look at

everything at

o Challenge driven innovation = approach to deal with sustainability challenges.

- Practical:

o grounded in research and with a back-casting process

o Including all stakeholders, dialogues for co-creating.

o Design thinking and system thinking and entrepreneurial system

- Questions remaining: this is only a course. Afterwards how to keep continuity? How to expand student

engagement?

- Example of projects: urban development, social integration, innovative construction methods

Wetenschapswinkel – science shop (Ghent and Brussels) = living labs in the Netherlands

- What?

o NGOs can ask for students to do a consultancy project to solve sustainability questions for them.

o First year

o GO connects research questions with NGOs and

- Challenges?

o Ask NGOs to give projects: build a network by talking to them and going to their meetings

o Students are afraid to write a thesis for an NGO instead of just only writing the thesis. Inform them!

How to find out why they are afraid?

o Some faculties in Belgium: fixed list of thesis topics. lobby to include these questions, find a

professor to supervise the student. A body should decide whether the research question is

suitable for a thesis.

- Learning moment?

o 18 questions for political sciences but no one who wanted to write the thesis on it

o Be realistic on your ambitions and talk with everyone

o Take baby steps and try to make it feasible

o The university is a country on its own

o Exchange with Brussels

Other GOS

Living lab in the Netherlands

- not only thesis, but also part of a course, internship, …

- not only NGOs, but also small and big companies

- sometimes also outside the GO not always focused on sustainability (for example in the universities of

applied sciences)

other GOs

- VU: also, big companies, not only theses but also part of course, internship, …

- The Hague: four living labs, not part of the GO

- Delft: sustainable transportation but also not part

of the GO

Results from working sessions: which are the goals

and principles in the education and research proposal

1. General framework for education and research:

Raise awareness and promote behaviour change

2. Creation of a GO network, also including non-GO

actors

3. Integration of different faculties: interdisciplinary

4. Research database: students, teachers, NGOs,

companies can go there (blackboard/SharePoint)

5. Continuity Long-time collaboration at the local level – champion in the staff

12th of December, working session in Rotterdam on Education and Research for Dutch and Belgian GOs

(organised by GO Rotterdam and Green Office Coordinator NL & Be. More info will follow

- Aim: share knowledge among all the operations coordinators.

- Specific goals:

- Volunteers

o How and where can you involve students

o How can you make people aware of your existence?

- Perception of stakeholders

- Collaboration with different facilities

What is working well?

Sustainability pact (Gent)

- All the several departments and groups of people who work together should start to work together.

- To make this happen we made a system. Groups are formed in the different faculties with researchers,

staff etc.

- We came up with some sort of list with things that can be done at the university (e.g. drink more tap

water), the groups can then check what is already done and what not. Then they can make the decision

of what they want to change. The groups think of how to make this happen. The best ideas of the year

we gather and are rewarded. We help with the facilitation.

- After three years, we started with a pact 2.0, these included a bit more advanced tasks (e.g. mobility).

We sat together with them to brainstorm about how to make bigger changes happen.

Our role is always to facilitate and give feedback. ± 70% of all the faculties are part of the pact.

- This is the fifth year that we’re doing this. It’s a nice model. The sustainable student movement helps us

to take care of it.

Checklist system (Leuven)

- Shows similarities to the Pact from Gent.

Catering (Maastricht)

- Most successful project was where we were active in catering. Lobbying with the catering (with the help

of facility services) towards making sustainable changes. Before we started they had 5% organic and 23%

sustainable food. We pushed them to 17% and 41%. We also lobbied for more sustainable coffee cups

and better waste separation.

- Lobbying: Representor of the caterer was difficult to work with. Try to not get in conflicts. Be respectful

to each other. Keep on meeting them. Ask questions as well (e.g. what is the downside of doing this).

Don’t let them put you in charge of choosing products. That is not what the student Green Office should

do.

What was strong in the project that it was indicated by higher institutions (e.g. governmental

legislation), whereas Meatless Monday is more difficult. There is no higher institution that tells them to

do this.

- In general, the students are not appreciating the sustainable changes in the catering service. The

university wants to change the contracts. This is good, we can have a say in the tender process.

To reduce meat consumption in kitchen

- Organize a big event in collaboration with a health organization.

- After this event, we made everyone sign a petition for a more sustainable kitchen.

Communication

- People who eat vegan don’t go to the canteen, they actively avoid the canteen. Part of our job at the

Green Office is to make sure that the canteen has an adequate offer. To make them aware of the

demand of the vegan meals.

Problems/goals (split in groups)

- Stakeholder collaboration

- Collaboration with the university

- Volunteers

Stakeholders collaboration

Problem: difficult to convince them to collaborate with us.

Solutions:

- Image of the GO: you should have regular meetings with the stakeholders (e.g. every month with

the catering company). Send them a formal agenda invite. Be interested in them as a person, don’t

be there only for you own interest. Also, ask questions, ask them ‘how can we help you?’

- Try to connect with other parties (teachers, staff).

- Design workshops in which they invited different stakeholders. Ask them what sustainability meant

to them. Then put all the information together and create goals, both for short and long term vision.

- Tenders: check when the contract is going to end. Give proper advice. Be in time doing this, be pro-

active and know when to do the tendering. Make sure you have access to the database to know all

about the contracts.

Collaboration within the university

Problem: get the name out, be visible. People can’t find us, don’t know that we exist.

Another problem: not being taken seriously.

Solution:

- Gather all the several sustainable initiatives. In doing this you also get many contacts with students

and staff. The best way to do this is to call and be a persuasive.

- Being taken seriously: board of the university should stand up for you.

- Have well-known names in your network.

- Snowball effect: if the students know you, they will help you. And if then more students know about

you, more students will help you.

- Network events: have meetings to know what everyone is doing and who is working on what issue.

- If you want to get in touch with someone who is highly ranked, find someone who is below that

person and connect with them, work your way up.

Volunteers

Problem: trouble engaging volunteers, involving students, having them engaged for a longer time.

Solutions:

- Professionalism: if you make it seem like a serious deal with responsibilities it gives them motivation.

- Divide them in teams based on their own interests

- Call them ‘members’ instead of ‘volunteers’.

- FREE FOOD

- Appreciation & seriousness.

- Endorse on LinkedIn > build CV.

Expectations:

- Learn from experiences

- Attract other people to GO

- Make GO popular, known

- Motivate people

- Methods how to communicate

- Build a community

- Involve international community

- Communication strategy

- Tasks that volunteers can do?

- Attract people not interested in sustainability

- Online communication – reaching the students

- Reach beyond the university

Working format

- Groups thinking about challenges of 1-4

- Groups thinking about solutions to 1-4

- Harvest

1. Online communication

a. Newsletters: do you want to be a volunteer? No, but you sign up with the newsletter

b. Facebook: posts for everyone – tag people in pictures, what is

i.

ii. Short movies work the best

iii. Pictures

iv. Long videos: put text in it so that they can also look at it without

v. Text

c. Use the screens on the university

d. Instagram: can be effective for informal moments – chilling in the office for example

e. E-mail: let one person check the e-mails

2. Attracting and keeping volunteers

a. Problem description

i. Why do we need volunteers?

b. Solution: How to attract and keep

1. Stand where you Collect e-mail addresses

2. Do a volunteering meeting

3. Do a brainstorm session and divide them further into group

4. Make them valued!

5. Alumni working

6. Feedback

c. Knowledge? What is most effective way of communication? On fb check, how much

d. Make a fb group

3. How to become known?

a. Who do we want to reach?

i. Faculty

ii. Staff

iii. Students

b. What is our vision – what do we want them to know about us

i. Our role in university

1. Open team meetings

2. Be professional

a. Email

b. No spelling

c. Clear structure

ii. What is about a green office

iii. Don’t hide behind the word sustainability (different interpretations are possible and

meanings can get lost)

1. Use other words. Ex. Let’s do Asian cooking instead of let’s do vegan cooking.

iv. Make it clear with what we feel and how many aspect, how wide this is.

c. How to appeal

i. Make events for different kind of people. Where you show different kind of aspect on

sustainability. Ex. Invite beekeepers. Attract other people

ii. Give valuable information for people in a context

1. Green introductory weeks

a. VU: in the basketball sports feel

i. Went by to all first-year classes related to sustainability

ii. `6-7 lecture talks during the lectures (by the hand of curricular

inventory)

b. Julius

i. Green city trip

ii. Green cooking

2. HU: get yourself out there to people that have it already in their mind

3. UU: sustainable food festival in the middle of the university – visibility is very

important! Approachable!

iii. Visible office!

1. People randomly walking in and passing by (UU)

2. Ghent: popup green office

iv. UU: cargo bike with solar panel and co

d. How to have dialogue with large groups

4. Networking

a. How much resources do you want to spend on the outreach

b. What is the aim of the outreach?

c. Outreach

i. Making a stakeholder analysis as a tool to get started and a clear vision

1. With whom?

2. How complex?

3. Outcome can be a contact list

ii. Amount of resources

iii. How to network within the university

iv. How is the knowledge managed and transferred?

1. Online tool

v. How to address the people of the different groups

1. Reflect on what is the

vi. Mental hierarchies between different initiatives?

1. Different power and voices

d. Initial dialogues to combine all stakeholders in the university

1. Ex. Of communication tool to decrease hierarchy: Fish bowl discussion (no

hierarchy) was part of a n official course and then reached out outside the

e. Longer time frames

1. Problem high flux and short time scales

2. Try to think both on small scale and longer time scale

3. One member responsible for communication

f. Best practices

i. VU: part of the Green Business club

ii. Network drinks be inviting and open

iii. Meeting with someone from staff or has power – go with two people so that the person

should faces to remember in order not to lose personal contact gfvyhuf

Expectations:

- How to organize (GO initiatives)

- Learn something

- A lot of initiatives

- Task division and internal communication between different portfolios

- Structure

- When an organization already exists, how to not get of track (continuity)

- Decision-making

o Students participate

- Best practices internal organizations

- Align internal organization with the strategy

- What portfolios are useful

- Long term strategies

Topics

- Task division Internal communication

- Starting a GO, designing, lobbying

- Expand/ evolve Long term

Working format

- Groups thinking about challenges of 1-4

- Groups thinking about solutions to 1-4

- Harvest

1. Internal communication

a. Organizing team meetings

i. Private vs professional communication Slack instead of Facebook (more professional)

b. Integrate volunteers into the working

c. Organizing team meetings

2. Long term strategy

a. Formulate long term goals – set priorities

b. Challenge: fragmentation and keeping the line

c. Collaboration with university: let them acknowledge your goals

d. Find consensus on what you work on and what not

i. Prioritize

3. Expansion

a. Challenges existing GOs have

b. More volunteers

c. Sponsoring on events

d. Grants for development

i. Find what is there and use it for your GO

e. Green guide that promotes sustainable student life

i. Ask for sponsoring for being present in the guide

1. Can be in the form of a membership card

f. Integration of staff members – advisory board

g. Importance of proposals and funding

h. Learning process: look for coaching at existing organizations

i. Expand beyond ecological sustainability but also gender, social, minorities, …

Problem analysis: University

- In how far is it a problem that universities do not act on sustainability? What is the impact that they could

have on advancing sustainability?

Large impact Small / no impact

Education - Students chose their professional career paths

at university

- Oftentimes it is the first time for students to

move out from home and it is a big break in

their lives where they are open to new ideas

- Students remember what they learn and the

curriculum and non-formal learning influences

their knowledge, skills and values

- Students anyway forget what they

learn within a university

- The real learning for the job then

takes place within the company

- The knowledge and skills they

learn now are anyway irrelevant

for the jobs they will have in 20-30

years

Research - Through becoming more inter and

transdisciplinary, research is aligned with and

makes significant contributes to solving societal

challenges by generating better understanding

of current system lock-ins and dynamics,

clarifying desirable and possible sustainable

future scenarios, and generating how-to

transformation knowledge to support actors in

the transition to creatie those futures)

- Research takes place within an

ivory tower and is just done by

academics for academics. For

research to have an impact, a

translation to society and the

market needs to take place

Operations - Universities with many and large buildings,

cafeterias, car fleets and laboratories have a big

environmental footprint and make a large

contribution here by reducing negative

footprint and working towards zero emissions,

zero waste, etc and eventually/ideally having a

positive, ie. regenerative footprint: going

beyond less bad to more good.

- Many other organisations (municipalities,

companies, etc) can learn from innovative

building designs, operational processes (supply

chain management, waste treatment, energy

infrastructures, etc) that universities

demonstrate as living labs.

- Universities have little operational

impact, compared to for instance

industrial production sites

- Universities can only ‘lead’ and

inspire changes in this area for

other organisations that mainly

have buildings and procure

products and services. For

industry, they can provide

relatively little ‘inspiration’.

Community - Universities develop a strong culture of social

responsibility, authentic / intrinsic motivation

to work towards sustainability, openness to and

collaboration among diverse actors and

worldviews, involving mutual learning: both

among the internal community of staff,

students and academics, but also in the

local/regional community: together with

companies, municipalities, civil society

organisations, etc.

- Only a marginal group of actors

who are part of the university

understand the importance and

care about acting towards

sustainability, while the majority

does not and/or delegates the

responsibility to the green-minded

folks.

- Sustainability is

Governance - Sustainability, or social responsibility more

generally, is core to the institution as a whole

and an organizing principle for all activities and

processes.

- A participatory culture and related structures

are in place for the enthusiasm, ideas and

capacities of diverse actors to be valued and

actively involved in co-creating the

sustainability strategy of the university

- The organizational culture is adaptive to quickly

respond to new ideas as well as to conditions of

a fast-changing societal context.

- Sustainability is (if at all) seen as a

priority for the university

leadership, only in terms of a

marketing tool (i.e. extrinsic

motivation) in relation to

investments and shareholders,

and as the responsibility only of a

specific department or program.

- Conservative, slow-moving

organizational culture is not

supportive of and adaptive to

innovations demanded by a

changing societal context

Impact vision & outcomes: University

Problem:

- Insufficiently acknowledged and realized responsibility of educational institutions to shape responsible

future generations in all areas of society, in a wide range of occupations

- HEIs contribute to and re-inforce unsustainability of society through their activities and processes

o Failing to adequately educate students but also to support learning in society at large (through

research and operations) for sustainability

- Lack of a clear stance to facilitate and accelerate sustainability transitions

o Science seen as value-neutral who shouldn’t be actively involved in shaping society

- Still largely focusing on minimizing problems (less bad) rather than maximizing solutions & opportunities

(more good)

- Lack of integrity / coherence when talking about and preaching sustainability (in PR, some courses or vision

statements) but not living fully in accordance with this when it comes to investments, operations

curriculum contents, research activities.

Impact Vision:

HEIs enact their societal responsibility to accelerate and facilitate transitions to sustainability in all societal

domains.

Outcomes:

- Sustainability or social responsibility at large becomes integrated in all areas of education, research,

operations and (formal and informal) governance, as well as the culture of the university community

- Key decision-makers in universities

o become aware of and take a stand for the societal responsibility of universities

o understand the ongoing paradigm shift and let go of the old, while opening up to new ways

o include societal responsibility in the core of the organizational mission and strategy, as a

guiding principle for all activities and processes

o stop seeing universities as profit-seeking business (even and especially if this is informal,

considering they are mostly still publically funded institutions!) and instead see them as for

benefit institutions in service of the common good.

- Cultural changes:

o An image change is required so that sustainability is seen not as a topic of concern for the

green-minded / neo-hippies / eco-freaks (...), but is relevant to all of us.

o Responding to sustainability challenges is widely seen as a need not a choice – about how we

can respond, not if.

o Critical thinking is embedded in all disciplines, but also in research and management to

question the status quo or dominant paradigm

Problem Analysis: Students

Assumption: engaging in trying to change their institution will greatly support students to be change-makers

later in life.

Students - Lacking “yes I can” attitude to change things

- Lacking confidence

- Lacking knowledge on

o Being a changemaker

o The role of universities and students in society

o Sustainability

- Lacking critical mindset

Staff (greatly

depend on national

- Lack of trust in students, not taking them and their views seriously

- Lack of willingness to even meet with students and hear them out

and regional

context)

Systematic - Bologna system means that students are only present at their institution for a

limited amount of time. They know this and it often translates into a lack of

willingness or interest in trying to change things. In other cases, they just don’t

ever get to know the institution well enough to realise what could be improved.

- Lack of inter-disciplinary and holistic approaches. Students are educated to be

“fachidioten” (idiots in all except in their own field).

Impact vision & outcomes: Students

Impact vision: Students become change-makers for a sustainable future during and after their studies.

Vision Outcomes

Students - Students possess a critical mindset,

but views and mindsets also remain

understandable and reasonable.

- Students have a “yes I can” attitude

towards changing their institution

and the world.

- Students are knowledgeable about

how to be a change-maker, how to be

critical, how their institution works

and sustainability.

- Students actively ask “why” they and

the institution are doing things.

o Students also question and

reflect on why they need to

engage in asking “why”.

- Students feel more emotionally

invested in their studies, enabling

them to be more effective at

learning.

- Students are more aware of their

power.

- Students of different mindsets engage in

dialogue with each other in a respectful and

open-minded fashion.

- Big course in the beginning and maybe also

at end of studies to learn about: truly critical

scientific method, how to be a change-

maker, how their institution works, what

the role of universities and students can be

in society and sustainability.

- Greater freedom for students for

determining what they want to learn,

though this must be limited by the general

knowledge required (see systematic issues

below).

Student and

Staff

relations

- Students and staff view each other as

co-learners. Both sides recognize the

discrepancies in knowledge, but staff

also see the value in the innovation

mindsets that students can offer.

- Students and staff trust one another

and respect one another and their

respective views and wishes.

- Greater dialogue between students and

staff on teaching and on general activities of

the university.

- Capacity building for students and staff on

giving and receiving feedback.

- Students give fair and reasoned

feedback and are provided with the

opportunity to do so.

- Staff accept feedback even if they

disagree and take it seriously.

Systematic - Students have possibilities regularly

to give feedback.

- Universities don’t only teach the skills

and knowledge needed to get the

best-paying job, but also what is

necessary to be change-makers and

responsible citizens.

- The university reflects more on why it

is doing the things it does and how it

does them. In this regard, the views

of students and staff are taken

seriously.

- There is a “safe space” where students don’t

have to be afraid to give critical feedback.

- Universities move away from a too strong

focus on “employability”, instead also

making sure that students receive the

education they need also as change-makers

and citizens.

- Effective student representation.

- Input sessions where students can pitch

ideas.

- Projects both extra- and intracurricular

which allow students to independently

make their own ideas happen.

Expectations

- How to lobby for/start it

- What to expect from it?

- Structure of GO

- Internal task division

- Lobby tricks & tips

- Get to know other people

- From starting GO to more integration

- Increase visibility of students

- Deepening knowledge that I have

Green office Model: in-depth

- GO model is a great tool for organizations that already have something and want to take a leap from

projects to a more coordinated process.

- The basic problem that the GO model can solve is when there already are people who want to do

something with sustainability, but there’s no connection between these people.

The 6 GO principles:

1) Students & staff: A dynamic team of student employees, volunteers and university staff form the core of a Green Office. They are directly responsible for running the Green Office and its activities.

2) Mandate: The Green Office receives an official mandate to drive the sustainability transition of the university, by creating new impulses, connecting and empowering actors, improving communications or developing sustainability strategies.

3) Resources: The university grants a budget to pay for salaries, training, project expenses and office space. These resources are crucial to guarantee the continuity and commitment of student, and enable them to implement high-impact projects.

4) Integration: The Green Office is integrated into the institution’s organisational structure, and is supervised by a steering group. The Green Office team also joins relevant sustainability committees.

5) Collaboration: All activities of the team are conducted in close collaboration and partnership with internal and external stakeholders. The Green Office also becomes part of the vibrant network of Green Offices around Europe.

6) Learning: The Green Office and its volunteers receive training from rootAbility. This helps to inspire and motivate them, and build their competencies as sustainability change agents.

Resources

Funds can come from different sources (Check slides)

Internal:

- Executive board or commissions

- Innovation fund

- Quality of education

- University governance

- Sustainability budget

- Student’s union

External: (attractive to smaller schools)

- Foundations: education, participation, engagement

- Ministries: research funding, climate mitigation

- EU: Climate KIC, Erasmus+, Regional development

- Main costs of most GO’s go to the Team, so for student & staff salaries, volunteer gifts, weekend retreats.

Furthermore, most things the GO does is very low-budget.

- It’s important to talk to someone from the finance department to find out how much it would cost to rent

an office space, how much it costs to pay staff and student.

Projects vs Process

Difference between being a process facilitator and a project manager:

- Project management is more practical, short-term and narrow-focused, as a project that has a clear

starting and ending point, where stakeholders are invited to contribute to the goals of the project, defined

by the project manager, i.e. the GO

- Process facilitation is broader, more long-term approach, looking at the bigger picture of the organization

/ system as a whole, identifying problems collectively and supporting various stakeholders to co-create

the solutions to those problems. Process facilitation also has more of an open-ending, because you can’t

predict what will happen with your knowledge only. It’s more about building relationships with and among

different actors.

- GO’s are still focussing mostly on separate projects, while we should focus more on facilitating processes.

Target focus

- Focus of GO’s is mostly on community projects that are low-budget and are mostly targeted at students.

- The ambitions are to act on all GO dimensions. We have to first generate a comprehensive overview of

what is already happening (or lacking) in different dimensions (research, education, community,

operations, governance), what we want to achieve in each of those domains, and only then establish which

processes and projects are required to get there. Otherwise we get lost in doing lots of nice projects

without having a clear view of where we are now and what we want to achieve for the organisation as a

whole. For example, you first need to get a clear definition of what Education for Sustainability means,

you need to set up a course inventory to know to what extent this is already part of the curriculum or not

and then find ways to integrate sustainability more into the curriculum.

Q&A with VU GO

- Marthe introduction: GO has been around for 3 years, studies Environment and Resource Management

- Shanice: Online community coordinator in GO VU, tries to reach more students, get more students

involved in the process

- Questions: How many student assistants do you have?

o 7 student assistants, 6 coordinators and one manager

o Network of 75 volunteers, each coordinator also has a team that works for each portfolio

o Some students have a project already in mind and they can come to the GO and work a project

with them. Those are hired as project members they can work with the GO.

- How is the interaction with the staff of the university?

o When they first started the GO, the university was quite sceptical of the GO. What are the

projects that you do? VU has a special programme team on sustainability. They were the first

people involved in setting-up the GO. One person from the Institute voor Milieuvraagstukken,

somebody from policy writing, somebody from energy centre, from facility services -> they were

all involved.

o There were no goals, no mission for the university to become sustainability. VU GO first initiative

for them to get the university more sustainable. Together with the GO they created an outline

for what would be sustainable for the university.

o Along the way they realized that the projects that were given them were not practical. After 1.5

years, they went through a transition that the GO started to do its own projects rather than the

university giving the GO some projects. Then the GO had more motivation and capacity to do

projects themselves. At the beginning, they needed the university to get an idea of projects they

could do, then they got more incorporated.

o At the beginning, they did not expect to so much from the GO. Then the students got rolling and

the mentality of the staff also changed that they take the GO much more seriously.

o They set the expectations themselves. The GO wrote a policy document of what they want to

achieve themselves.

o Marthe and programme team sits together once per month and sits down with board of the

Executive Board every four months to report on progress

- What are the goals of the GO?

o Every portfolio has their specific targets to work towards

- How do you keep your team motivated, inspired and connected?

o Every week they have a team meeting. This is strict, it is not to be missed

o They are colleagues and friends as well

o Something that benefits the team is that they had a retreat. Together they went to Tessel, an

island in NL. Every half year, they planned together and

o Team is very informal, they always do a round

- How many hours do you work per week in the GO?

o 8 hours paid and then 12 hours’ voluntary

o Around 400 Euro salary per month

o Is that fair for a GO?

o They love to do this. They do not see it as a job they get money for.

Lobbying

5 steps towards your Green Office:

1. Forming the initiative

2. Discovery (Your organization and its context & GO model and Movement)

3. Proposal Writing

4. Engaging people & building alliances

5. Submission & Decision

- Purpose of creating the membership structure is to move from Islands of communication to communities

of practice, and from sporadic links to more joint action, so as to take the next step towards realising the

impact we seek to achieve (which we can only do if we act together and not isolated).

- The process we’re going through: we’ve already talked to a lot of people and feedback is already

integrated

- Take away from the vision session

o Is very ambitious, not just focused on one university, but on the role of universities as accelerators

for sustsainability transitions in society

o If we want impact, in terms of empowering students to become change-makers, it can’t stop when

people graduate, we need to support them afterwards too to continue being engaged as change-

makers in their careers.

- Commercial endeavours of rootAbility (e.g. paid workshops) help fund (i.e.cross-finance) the activities we

do for facilitating the movement-building. However, this is not enough and the other sources of financial

support that enabled our movement-building so far came through unsustainable sources like grants / prize

money. We cannot rely on this as stable funding so we need a more long-term resourcing strategy for the

movement as a whole (so not just for rootAbility as an organization that works in service of the movement).

Group 1

- Article 2.

o To make a difference between a Vision and Working Document (with goals and objectives)

o Vision is not something that changes, more a constant in the long-term, serving as an anchor point.

So we don’t need to and shouldn’t change the vision at the GAs. Also don’t want to vote on knitty-

gritty details (phrasings, choice of words, etc). Keep it more broad and simple.

o Plans and objectives can be more seen as guidelines for orientation and can change, according to

new information, unpredictable events and learnings about how to better work towards our vision.

GOs can chose themselves which strategy to adopt to work towards the shared vision, as

individual organizational contexts are too different.

- Article 3

o 1. A. rA makes sure it happens.

o 1. B. “or however we will call it” / “members”

o 1. C. could it be risky to speak on behalf of everyone? Clarify which type of statements rA can

make on behalf of the movement. Do we need some checks and balances, which kind? Are GOs

speaking on behalf of themselves or representing their universities? Important to recognize

diversity of institutional contexts.

o 1. D. sounds strange: why phrase negatively? Is it needed?

o To what extent are we setting up a legal body?

Answer: We are not launching a new legal body. Instead we chose a (still legally binding)

“service contract” between rootAbility and members, as a way to formalize the

membership structure, in place of official statutes, thereby avoiding the administrative

hassle of setting up a formal association. Also there would be challenges with setting up

a legal association such as: if a Green Office is a member is the entire university a member?

Universities fear this, or it might simply not be possible.

o To what extent do we want to be formal? Be aware of “controlling” attitude that could emerge

from having things too formalized and maintain a trusting attitude. Still, it’s important for having

clarity reliability. As soon as you put thing on paper it becomes formal.

o 2. “exclusively responsible” is confusing -> rephrase / clarify: other GOs / rA don’t have a say in

the workings of a GO (i.e. don’t interfere in their decisions, but can only guide or suggest things)

o What is the point of this document? It’s a contract.

o 2.B. leave this out because it should be defined once and not change

o If we chose NOT go through the hassle of becoming an official organization, some words need to

be changed, so as to avoid confusion and mis-understandings on behalf of universities (so we need

different word for instance for General Assembly)

Group 2

o Talked about members, ‘founding members’ too branding, exclusion

o Who chooses who get the label Green Office? How does this work exactly?

Indicators?

Using a self-evaluation tool instead of a formal assessment

I.e. “these are principles and these are different ways you can fulfil them…”

o Sharing confidential information within the network only, while knowledge sharing in general

should not just take place with other green offices, but with the whole world! Idea of radical

openness. This is going to be discussed in the next half year: How much information should be

open? If information is too open is, people won’t pay for membership..? The idea could be that

the value of being a member is more the implicit knowledge, through being part of a community,

not just the explicit knowledge that can be documented in text.

o To make clear what percentage of the membership fee goes to national coordinator positions, if

there is no such coordinator position you could think of pooling (saving the money) and using it

for something at the national level.

o Idea of membership contributions being voluntary contributions instead of fixed amounts: more

based on gift economy and solidarity principles: give what you can and what, what is right for you.

- Group 3

o More quantifiable goals that Green Offices agrees upon

o What do we need in addition to vision?

Visions for the whole movement needed

Then quantifiable goals for the whole movement -> break it down to country goals ->

Have everyone GO contribute to this

o How to get GOs to do it?

Provide standardized forms

Provide training

By joining this network, you commit to collecting data

We need a programme for the GOs to go through when you set-up a GO.

o What do we want to avoid?

Avoid ranking between GOs, because they are all very different. Want to avoid notion of

one Go being “better” or “higher” than another

Monitoring and controlling each other’s performance

o Who collects the data?

Coordinator

Research thesis

Student specifically hired for this

o What level do we connect data on?

On the GO

On the university

here all GOs can collect energy, waste and water consumption

here you need the same measurement baseline

o What data should we collect?

Number and types of projects done

Number of students reached

Amount of budget spend

o Why do we need data?

Get funding

Gain legitimacy and become a trustful partner

Enable GOs to compare their own performance over time (no

Put data out for the university

Goal of session

Creating action plan by elaborating on input from previous sessions.

The GO movement has two core frames:

1) University focus → embedding sustainability within the institution to accelerate sustainability transitions

in society

2) Student focus → enable students to become change-makers during and after their studies

What needs to happen to have these come about? What are the key action points?

In previous sessions, several action points were created:

1) University focus: Create living labs, collaborate with local partners, increase sustainability research across

disciplines, platform for sharing knowledge between GO's.

2) Student focus: Give space for empowerment students e.g. training, also focus on transition from students

to when they start working, career program for social entrepreneurship.

In this session, the group divided in 3 groups to elaborate further on the themes:

- Curriculum change

- Network platform & Knowledge transfer

- Alumni/career

For each theme the group discussed:

- What needs to happen in the long run (5 years) and the short run (next year)

- What are the steps that need to happen to achieve this that can take place on a local GO level, at a level

of collaboration between GOs and on the inter/national network level (rootAbility, Studenten voor

Morgen, Netzwerk N, NUS).

Results

Network platform & knowledge transfer

5 Years Next Year (start)

GO Level Each GO shares their “frontrunner”

project as a best practice every

year.

Collaboration

Skills-sharing

o In person

working sessions

(regional)

o Webinars

(international)

Templates

developed

through an

international

working group.

E.g. budget plan,

stakeholder

mapping, project

planning canvas.

(Inter)-

National

Network

(rootAbility,

Morgen,

Netzwerk-N

etc.) o Process handbooks

o Explain how to go through

certain processes. E.g. guide

to lobbying, activism, team

management, launching a

forum with staff members/

students.

o National and EU lobbying for

sustainability based on specific

needs of the higher education

sector.

o rootAbility GO awards

o Awards given out to GOs.

Everyone wins one, just a

nice way to show

appreciation and identify

the strengths of different

GOs.

o Project guides of the shelf

o Gives standardized way of how

a certain project can be done

along with examples of how it

was successfully done

elsewhere.

o Enables better tracking of what

projects are done by different

GOs + more of a “common

language”, using the same

terms when talking about

similar projects

o Database allowing GOs to share their

documents

o Central platform for all the sharing

activities and communication (try to

connect to Netzwerk-N platform)

o Representative survey of what

student employees of GOs got from

their time at the GO in terms of

personal growth, learning etc.

o Operations: list of (all) measures you

can take

Curriculum change

1) Vision: Enable students to become change agents for sustainability

2) Problems:

a. Monodisciplinary study programs

b. Lack of active, engage students / absence of a „Yes we change” attitude

c. Lack of knowledge about how to convince change makers

3) Solutions:

a. Multi-, inter- and transdisciplinary approaches in teaching and research

b. Living lab

c. Formats for activate the intrinsic motivations of students

d. Multidisciplinary student projects, starting at bachelor level

e. Course “Introduction of Ethics and the responsibility to science” for all students

f. Sustainability minor across all disciplines

g. Sustainability courses as part of the General studies

h. Mapping of Best-Practices ESD (Education for sustainable development) single courses and study

programs

i. Sustainability week within the semester

4) Action plan for some solutions:

We now developed a rough plan for three different solutions for curriculum change:

Level Today 2020

Project ESD Course inventory ESD course syllabus All study programs

are contributing to a

sustainable future

Local context

(GO XY)

- Survey and selection of

existing courses

- Key: let all teaches

explain, how their course

is contribution to SD

(=proof reversal)

- also mobilise human

resources on top of the

GOs

- Program development:

establishing positive and

negative criteria for ESD

courses

- make it participatory for

students

- tbc -

GO collaboration at

national level (e.g.

netzwerk n)

- develop a template for

the survey and criteria for

selecting the courses

- national overview of

existing ESD courses and

whole programs.

- tbc -

- networking and sharing

of experiences

- lobby for structural change

of universities (e.g. for more

general studies) and financial

funds

- assistance for writing

project proposals

- networking for a common

project proposal by several

GOs

- networking with relevant

actors at the federal and

regional revel

GO movement

(international)

- develop a template for

the survey and criteria for

selecting the courses

- networking and sharing

of experiences

- assistance for writing

project proposals

- networking for a common

project proposal by several

GOs

- networking with relevant

actors (UN-bodies, EU, etc.)

- tbc -

GO Alumni group / Action planning

- Good practices: Find out what are GOs already doing to assist their alumni? We can spread this among

other GOs, e.g. through blogposts and trainings to help them develop their relationships with alumni

- Survey among alumni -> just spread the survey and in this way, also collect the contact details from

alumni

o Current occupation

o % of time spent looking for a job

o Age, gender

o What do they need from rootAbility, i.e. possible things that could be organised in the alumni

network and seeing what could be organised there: Develop their knowledge + personal

development + finding a job + more networking (events, platform) to connect to other alumni

o What could they offer and want to offer to students in GOs

o Services and things, they are doing to

- Do a market analysis for what organisations are out there and are already doing stuff to support

students entering (sustainable) jobs. Find organisations that we can partner with

- Do a customer journey: What is their way after their studies? What are their pains? How are they trying

to relief these pains now?

- Linking GO alumni next year to the summit

o They organise a track

o Find them some people that might be willing to take a coordinating role

- Summer school programme for GO alumni

- Contact GOs to get an overview of the alumni they had

o Alumni might not want that their contact details are getting shared

- Recruitment services: Can we help companies that alumni work for with recruitment?

- Organise a first alumni gathering: also find a few alumni who would volunteer to be more involved in

developing the alumni network

- Make a LinkedIn group and Facebook group for GO alumni

- Make profiles of GOs

- Share information

o Overview of career opportunities

o Internship and job offerings

o In how far are universities and other actors already doing this?

o Just start with an overview of existing platforms to find sustainability focused jobs

- Overview

o Track of what people do after GO

- GO programme as educational programme

- Peer coaching

o Sharing and supporting each other through Alumni mentoring and coaching

- Workshops and training alumni on specific needs / topics

- Annual GO alumni fundraiser

o Giving more clarity of what

- Critical question

o Are GO alumni going to participate in event?

o Sell-out to companies: What does this mean? How can we avoid this?

- Tiny dots – this is us

- Beach photo – we all want to be there

- We need to get out of our bubbles.

- The people we affiliate with, tend to have the same values as we have. Who was surprised to see trump

winning the presidential elections? Many people raise their hands.

- We are surrounded by people who usually have

- Algorithms reaffirm your viewpoints, that aren’t necessarily shared by everyone.

- The systems pleases the thoughts that we currently have, which makes it easy not to be critical or conflict

with other people.

- We shouldn’t be surprised that trump won, because it happened in another universe that doesn’t touch

upon our own universe.

- If we imagine humanity 50-100 from now, what will be analysed? What were they able to predict? Some

of it was predictable – the point is, being in a situation, it’s hard to see the total picture.

- Historical events – imagine yourself in WO2. We couldn’t imagine being in there. But we are resilient – we

can move on from being in horror situations.

- A single event might feel like a single event. But it’s hard to connect single events together. We might look

back in the future, and realise that Trump and Brexit were part of a bigger picture that we’re all part of.

- There’s so much more going on. There’s a bunch of stuff that we need to change. You might feel irrelevant

or small, but together we are extremely powerful. There’s a lot we can do – it’s a challenge to us.

- Our world is sustainable. The earth will be fine without us. But we’re screwing it up. We are fighting

ourselves and the systems we have created.

- NY- the city that never sleeps. Imagine it does sleep and people are gone. What’s going to happen then –

trees will grow back.

- We fucked up and need to remake it sustainable. The UN came up with 17 goals to get there.

- 15 years to complete all the goals – how are we going to do this?

- Government, business, society. But also, you. Change starts with you. If you don’t change yourself, how

can we expect others to change?

- Sometimes sustainability feels like a big, difficult thing to do. But we can do small things in our daily lives

that contribute to this, [quote Margaret Mead].

- By being here we’re already doing this. Already more than many other people out there. Zita Luiten wants

to challenge us for the next three weeks to do something different in our lives. They say it takes 21 days

to create a habit.

- Plastic surgeon in the 1960s- after people get a new face or nose, it took them 21 days to get used to it.

People started using the 21-day term.

- Do something different in your life working towards the sustainable development goals. There are 17 goals

in here – please pick one. You can also do one on your own, but please share it. At world merit, we do this

a lot, and it creates a ripple effect. It shows that everyone can make a difference. Doesn’t matter where

you’re from, what education you had, or what you say. It’s all about what you do.

- In today’s world were completely interconnected. World merit uses the potential of this by bringing

people together online – common purpose, to make the world better in your own way. Were a global

community of change makers coming together on a platform. We make a connection, collaborate beyond

beliefs and boarders. We set challenges. Organise a march for something that you are truly passionate

about. In reward, they get credits for which you get opportunities. You can win internships, conference

tickets, etc.

- It doesn’t matter what you say you’re doing, it’s about showing what you’re doing.

- 360ppl come together in the merit to tackle the sustainable development goals. They share ideas,

collaborate and come up with projects to tackle the goals. One action plan with 17 different projects was

presented at the UN. I want to show one last video about this merit. Give you a feel of the experience

- They opened applications for merit360 nr.2. 24th of August in NY. There might also be one in Kazakhstan.

Many visa denials – we’re an all-inclusive community so we want to do something about this.

- Of you have a passion and you’re willing to fight, there is an opportunity for you. My boss never looked at

my cv – I showed a passion and a drive. What counts in the world of today is passion and action, not just

words? That’s why we’re here today. We are acting. I truly believe that if we all do something in our lives,

we can make it.

- It makes me feel powerful looking at the image of the pixels. It makes me realizes that lots of stuff needs

to change, it gets me out of my bubble. The fact that we’re all here is already showing that we’re

committed to change something. Overall, making the world sustainable is not going to be easy. But we

can do it. We need to make the connections around the world.

- The bottle is the message. I was in New York last year and I took a picture there – I noticed two things.

- Bottles on the metro track. 65mil PET water bottles sold every day. 15% gets recycled. The other 85% is

burned or ends up in the environment. It’s the example of single use materials. It ends up on the tracks.

Copenhagen – in front of a gym. In Denmark, there is a deposit system – you will get a refund when you

bring bottles back. But still people manage to not bring it back.

- Picture of the Philippines, picture of the Amsterdam canals. In NL, all the water is connected. In the end,

it will end up in the ocean, in the plastic soup.

- If I were to throw my bottle away and it ends up in the ocean it would still be a bottle – but this is not true.

The plastic degrades into micro plastics.

- Fish with lots of plastics inside. Fish eat it, ingest it, but no digestion because its plastic. The fish starve –

they feel full, but they’re not.

- Awareness of plastic issues

- Promotion of tap water – we’ve got great quality tap water. And it’s cheap. Tap water costs a euro per

1000 litres. You pay so much more for bottled water. Obviously, the water quality isn’t that awesome

everywhere. But in NL its awesome.

- Be the change. GO is an awesome example. But also, Patagonia, Tony Chocoloney

- Tour around the Dopper office.

- Want to create a community of people that want to do something.

- Fun, responsible,

- Plastic Madonna, limited edition doppers,

- Going to yoga event – easy to convince these people. They will be a messenger and share the story that

we’re trying to tell.

- B-talk: benefit talk. We open our doors so people can visit, where we invite social enterprises. Inspiring

and being positive about other stories.

- Last campaign we started: PET-free campaign. If you want to drink water you can only have tap water. We

did this together with the Green Office of the VU. We’re sick of the PET-water bottles, let’s move to a more

sustainable solution.

- For all the universities who want to collaborate – contact dopper at the end of the meeting

- For Dutch students – win a scholarship of 3.000eu

- People with Dopper bottles are messengers

- Hand out doppers!

- Minimum order of 60 bottles.

- Cradle to cradle bottle – it is not made from recycles plastic, but made from recyclable plastic. If something

breaks, you can send it to us, and we make a new bottle out of it.

- The bottles are produced in the Netherlands. We could produce it in China as well, but we want to do it

locally. The societal profit is higher, because the carbon footprint is much lower.

- The steel bottle is produced in China. If we would produce it in NL, you would pay 60eu per bottle.

- We can’t make it fully out of recycled plastics. There are certain laws that need to be applied – e.g. if the

plastics used to hold toxins, you can’t use it to put beverages in. As you are never sure about this, you

can’t allow it.

- We’re not against plastics, because it’s a durable product. But don’t make a single use product out of it.

The negative side then is its durability, because it never degrades.

- Why no deposit like we have in Denmark? – it’s all about politics.