Experiential Education Associations and Hubs

The Sustainability Squad

The experiential education model is the foundation from which I have built a co-curricular experience for learners outside of the classroom in the form of a college-wide student club.

The Sustainability Squad is a registered-club with the Student Association of George Brown College (SAGBC) for which I am the Faculty Advisor. The club has been a haven for hundreds of dedicated executive and general members over the years.

The broad goals of the club include:

1) building a campus community and culture around sustainability;

2) offering a safe space through which learners can bond over friendships;

3) providing an educational space through which members can learn substantive knowledge around sustainability;

4) providing a framework through which learners can implement sustainability projects and initiatives; and

5) helping learners develop soft skills and human skills. It is through the experience of interacting with others, researching and learning about campus and broader sustainability challenges, creating and executing projects and initiatives, and running the club itself that students are learning, practicing, and growing.

One of the ways that the experiential education model is helpful is toward the development of soft skills and human skills. To begin, I ask student members to participate in facilitated leadership and communication workshops. And then, as members begin to work on agenda setting and managing club participation they develop those leadership skills. As members share their ideas, build consensus, and garner buy-in for projects and initiatives they develop those communication and collaboration skills. As a group, we then debrief the projects and initiatives to reflect and think on the successes and challenges, and implement changes moving forward. And lastly, we repeat the learning cycle again with new projects and initiatives.

Another way that the experiential education model is helpful is toward the development of substantive sustainability knowledge, in line with the implementation of projects and initiatives. I encourage members to research and develop ideas and projects that directly relate to their specific areas of study and prospective career goals, in order to bring sustainability into their field. As an example, a Construction Management student developed an interactive project in which she freely provided raw materials and then taught community members how to build a birdhouse in order to support the rewilding of urban spaces. As another example, a Business and Marketing student led an engaging social media campaign to showcase the importance of growing and maintaining native plant life.

The club is fueled by and helps to accomplish numerous of the UN SDGs. The club itself is working with Global Goal 4 Quality Education at its core. More specifically, the various projects and initiatives implemented by club members also contribute, even in small ways, to various Global Goals. For example, both the birdhouse build project and native plant social media campaigns named above contribute to SDG 11 Sustainable Cities and Communities and by reducing the environmental impact of cities through urban rewilding efforts (target 11.6).