Office of Sustainability

Sustainability Peer Educators (SPE)

What Are SPEs?

WCU Sustainability Peer Educators (SPEs) are undergraduate students hired to help organize and lead sustainability education and outreach programs on campus. SPEs are primarily responsible for developing and implementing sustainability-focused events and programming to inform and educate students on campus on how to live with more sustainable values. SPEs may also assist with other sustainability-related initiatives of the WCU Sustainability Council, the Office of Sustainability, and organizations with similar ideals. The position of the SPE was created to promote a thorough understanding of sustainability by emphasizing the interconnections between the environmental, social, and economic aspects of our local and global societies. SPEs work to encourage their peers to embrace sustainability principles and promote conscious, healthy, and just futures for all.

Mission and Vision

Sustainability Peer Educators (SPEs) envision a campus where all students have adopted and practice sustainable values and principles in their everyday lives. Whether it be through smaller switches or larger initiatives, the goal is to increase awareness and knowledge amongst campus peers. SPEs strive to communicate ideals in a way that allows students with and without prior knowledge about sustainability to get involved with events and adapt certain ideals to merge with the overarching goals of WCU’s Carbon Neutrality Plan.

Through classroom education, event and workshop activities, and being visible to students, our peer educators strive to start the conversation about sustainability concerning social, economic, and of course, environmental aspects. SPEs strive to help students make connections between the values of the three pillars and their own lives to help, “meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs,” - United National Brundtland Commission, 1987