How It Works

Overview

The Sustainability Ambassadors is an immersive leadership experience for UBC students interested in personal, collaborative, and community-engaged learning. The program is designed to offer opportunities for critical and creative engagement, and experiences for students to practice their leadership skills and sustainability competencies, through learning, planning and implementing projects, events and workshops to advance UBC sustainability priority areas and goals.

Sustainability Ambassadors are further eligible for certification through the Catalyst program.

 

Program Goals

Participant-focused

• Develop sustainability competencies and skills to foster learning, equity, and mutual respect 
• Develop project management and facilitation skills

Community-focused

• Increase awareness of, and engagement in, sustainability and climate issues on- and off-campus 
• Help facilitate community learning workshops
• Increase involvement in sustainability and climate action 

 

Commitments

Sustainability Ambassadors engage the community in sustainability- and climate-related opportunities and work collaboratively with key groups/units to advance sustainability and climate goals. 

Students develop core sustainability leadership competencies (self-awareness, systems thinking, strategic application, interpersonal and collaboration, and interdisciplinary integration) in a cohort focused on one of five themes: biodiversity, climate, resilient communities, ethical civic engagement, and justice. Each cohort has 10 Ambassadors who will receive specialized programming and learning sessions, including workshops and discussions to support learning on their topic.

Sustainability Ambassadors work closely with their Sustainability Leader and as part of a team to engage the community through:

1. Outreach events. Each core area team will design and facilitate events on topics related to an impact area (Climate: climate justice and Resilient communities: SDGs). The Ambassadors will also assist their Sustainability Leader in facilitating community workshops. 
    
2. Planning and implementing projects. Each team will work closely with a UBC team to support the core impact area goals. These are pre-conceived projects that are planned in collaboration with a UBC program partner.

 

Time requirements

While this is a volunteer position, Ambassadors can enroll in and gain Directed Studies credits for their involvement and commitment to the program. Ambassadors are responsible for an average contribution of 4-5 hours per week as follows:

• 2 hours per week: Ambassador team meetings and ongoing training
• 2-3 hours per week: Development, facilitation, and delivery of workshops and events and support project logistics/planning

 

Position term

Successful candidates will commit to an 8-month period (September 2023-April 2024).

 

Training

Students will develop key sustainability competencies and engage in leadership training by Sustainability Leaders, with support from the UBC Sustainability Hub’s Teaching, Learning & Student Engagement (TLSE) team. Training sessions will be held during meetings and on key training days. There will also be on-going discussions on sustainability issues and topics during weekly meetings, to ensure baseline knowledge about sustainability resources at UBC. 

Please note that these training sessions and meetings are mandatory – if you are a successful applicant, you will be asked to clear your schedule of classes or other commitments during these times. Please build your schedule around these times.

• Spring Welcome event: April 14, 2023 (note that exams begin April 17)
• Sustainability Ambassadors Orientation: September 16, 2023, 8:45am-4:30pm
• Weekly team meetings:  These meetings will be determined in consultation with the cohort teams and the Sustainability Leader. Weekly team meetings will occur every week throughout the academic year. 
• Support Ambassador recruitment through group interview facilitation and attend the 2024 Spring Welcome event to welcome new Ambassadors.

 

Cohorts

Please note that not all cohorts listed below may be offered next year. We are confirming partnerships with cohort mentors and will be able to update the invited candidates during the interviews in March.​

Climate
Engage with the concept of sustainability through a climate lens, including the fundamental understanding of climate, how and why it is changing, and what we need to do to protect it. Learn to integrate climate science, societal knowledge, and self in working towards the climate emergency. Learn more

Climate Action
Engage in collective action by co-creating innovative climate solutions in collaboration with community partners to help transform neighbourhoods and communities on and off-campus. Develop your leadership capacity and ability to analyze complex social and environmental issues, increase your understanding of local contexts, and co-create climate actions.

Emotional Resilience
Engage with your own emotional response to the climate crisis while exploring and designing engaging community outreach resources and materials, including educational toolkits and modules. Students will help build upon the Sustainability Hub’s work in fostering a culture of engagement and advocacy by facilitating community engagement and expanding sustainability education opportunities and resources for the UBC community and the broader public.

Climate & Movement
Engage with physical activity and sustainability to support the work in promoting movement and building resilience through a climate action lens. Support actions that address sedentary behaviour through active transportation and off-campus movement opportunities.

Circular Economy
Learn about circular economies through the lens of UBC’s Climate Action Plan (CAP 2030) and net zero emission targets. Engaging principles of climate justice are particularly relevant when developing climate actions related to food systems, commuting and business air travel. Identify and implement solutions integral to shifting cultural norms, while ensuring an equitable approach.

Food Systems
Students in this cohort will engage meaningfully with the food crises through interdisciplinary and experiential learning opportunities, mentorship, and networking. Students will learn to integrate critical food systems topics such as food insecurity, food sovereignty, and global connections through applied projects which tackle research questions posed by campus partners and policymakers.