Santa Clara University
EN-3: Student Life

Into the Wild (Outdoors Club) provides students with opportunities to get off campus and explore California’s wilderness. Every week are organized trips for all skill levels that include hiking, backpacking, snow camping, rock climbing, kayaking, rafting, surfing, and more. Into the Wild aims to promote healthy, sober fun while encouraging education in environmentally sustainable practices.

The GREEN (Grass Roots Environmental Efforts Now) Club is the University's environmental club which seeks to promote sustainability to the campus community through focused projects, events such as Earth Week, and community action. Some of the projects GREEN Club leads include Oceans, to promote marine conservations, Think Outside the Bottle, to encourage tap water over bottled water, and divestment.

Santa Clara Community Action Program (SCCAP) is a community-based, volunteer service organization dedicated to applying education to social service. SCCAP promotes social awareness, leadership for social justice, and compassion. SCCAP promotes the holistic education of the volunteer by serving the surrounding community and by reflecting upon social justice issues, with the intent of challenging the participants to commit to creating a more humane and just world.

Bronco Leaders for Environmental Justice Investigating Truth (B LEJIT) is focused on promoting environmental justice on campus, in the local community, and on a national and global scale.

The Solar Decathlon team is a group of undergraduate students that designs and builds a completely solar-powered home each year to compete in the annual international Solar Decathlon sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy. Their entries into the 2007 and 2009 Solar Decathlons both earned 3rd place in the competition. Their 2013 entry placed 5th in engineering and 11th overall. Note: both 2007 and 2009 solar houses are permanently in operation on the SCU campus.

Amnesty International promotes awareness about worldwide human rights and justice issues and empowers student to make a difference.

Engineers Without Borders partners with developing communities worldwide in order to improve their quality of life.

The Environmental Law Society promotes environmental awareness on campus and in the surrounding community. It also encourages students to pursue careers in environmental law by sponsoring educational and networking events on current topics in environmental law.

Global Medical Brigades pools medical resources and professionals together and organizes a brigade to Honduras with the purpose of helping patients in need and delivering medical supplies.

SCUBA Club is a recreational diving club which fosters a connection to nature.

Sustainable Business Club is an organization for students to engage other students about the triple bottom line of sustainability, learn about corporate social responsibility, and to network with sustainable companies and organizations. This club aims to familiarize Santa Clara business students with the role sustainability plays in a real life corporate setting and provides opportunities for students to network and build relationships with business leaders in the Silicon Valley who recognize sustainability as a key component of 21st Century business careers.

The Freedom Project raises awareness about issues of slavery and trafficking and engages community about the cycle, social/emotional implications, and sustainable solutions positive changes in our curriculum and our community.

The Student Animal Legal Defense Fund (SALDF) seeks to raise the profile of the field of animal law and educate students and the community on the cruelty that animals face every day, from the evils of factory farming to criminal animal abuse that goes unprosecuted.

SCU Rotaract is an organization for students and young business professionals interested in service in both the local and global communities, as well as professional and social networking.

Public Health Science Club facilitates the acquainting of public health majors and other scientific fields that may pursue careers in the medical field other than medical school itself. The club provides guidance and advice regarding public health courses and the public health major as a whole.

Retail Studies Student Association: engages students about LEAD (Leaders in Environment, Art, & Design), ways to get involved in sustainable retail fields, and educate about sustainable retailers and best practices.

Society for Women Engineers: increases awareness, support for, and community strength of the female engineers on campus and mentors high schoolers interested in pursuing engineering.

Hero Projects: a service club that spreads the word about the opportunity to have a life-changing experience by participating on a 2-week trip that combines outdoor recreation and meaningful, sustainable volunteer projects in places in need, and to raise funding for prospective students participating in these experiences.

All organizations included here are student-governed.

The Forge is SCU’s organic campus and community education garden where students can volunteer, learn about sustainable agriculture, and participate in community events. Named for its history as SCU's original blacksmithing site, this one-half acre garden has multiple annual and perennial garden beds for vegetables, grains, flowers and native plants. The Forge hosts a weekly farmstand, among other events, where students can visit and purchase vegetables from the graden.

The Center for Sustainability supports a local, organic CSA for members of the SCU community and its surrounding neighbors through its collaboration with the Catalán Family Farm. CSA boxes are delivered to campus every Tuesday.

Sustainability-related events and speakers are often hosted by the Food and Agribusiness Institute, Ignatian Center for Jesuit Education, the Center for Science, Technology, and Society, and various other campus organizations.

Annual events include:
- Earth Week, which features speakers, an Earth Day Fair, and a battle of the bands;
- Campus Sustainability Week in October is sponsored by the Center for Sustainability, and includes a fair, student panels, workshops, and more.

The Eco-Fashion and Art Show (an annual event started in 2010) is a night to celebrate art and music by seeing eco-fashion on the runway, a recycled art gallery, and music, all showcasing the talents of Santa Clara students. Student designers and artists are asked to reuse old or recyclable materials that would normally have to go to landfill to creatively create a piece of art. The de Saisset Museum often hosts art exhibits related to sustainability, including Reduce, Reuse, Re-imagine. The artists in this exhibition take that tradition one step further—they look not only to discarded materials, but to detritus. Engaging a Zero Waste philosophy, the participants in Reduce, Reuse, Re-imagine rescue objects from the waste stream—items disposed of as trash rather than recyclabled by local residents and businesses—and re-imagine them in a new context to create original, enticing, and thought-provoking works of art. Through their work, the artists shed creative light on our role as active participants in the management of earth's limited resources.

Into the Wild provides students with opportunities to get off campus and explore California’s wilderness. Every week are organized trips for all skill levels that include hiking, backpacking, snow camping, rock climbing, kayaking, rafting, surfing, and more. Into the Wild aims to promote healthy, sober fun while encouraging education in environmentally sustainable practices. Into the Wild is a student-governed program.

Into the Wild:
Into the Wild is a student club committed to the Leave No Trace principles that joins together students with a shared interest and/or passion for the outdoors and outdoor activities, such as hiking, backpacking, and camping, among other activities.

The Center for Sustainability has developed a Sustainability Liaison Network that engages sustainability enthusiasts across the campus to further develop a culture of sustainability at SCU and to learn, share, and educate peers about sustainable life skills. LOCALS (Living Off Campus and Living Sustainably) encourages students living off-campus to engage their housemates and neighbors in sustainable behaviors in order to develop a culture of sustainability among students at SCU. SCOOPS (Students Collaborating and Organizing Opportunities and Projects for Sustainability) empowers Santa Clara University students in leadership positions to implement the University's Strategic Plan by fostering Justice and Sustainability programs among student organizations.

Students apply to be selected for an internship with the Center for Sustainability. Students are selected based on their professionalism, proof of leadership abilities, and passion to learn more about sustainability. Each Intern has a different focus area: Student Engagement, Employee Engagement, Residence Life, Communications, Athletics & Recreation, Forge Garden Events & Outreach, Waste Diversion, Academics, and Curriculum Development.

Seniors pledge to consider the social and environmental consequences of their careers. By taking the Graduation Pledge, they define for themselves what it means to be socially and environmentally responsible. There is not obligation to turn down jobs... the graduation pledge is simply a way to ensure that one's job represents more than a paycheck.

The Alumni Office hosts a sustainability-themed event called "Life After SCU: Entertain on a Budget" where students receive a framework and handful of ideas on how to entertain guests with a limited budget and a willingness to be self-sufficient, environmentally-conscious, and innovative.

Santa Clara University has eight Residential Learning Communities (RLCs), each with a specific theme and programming which focuses on certain core values. CyPhi's theme is rooted in sustainability and the arts. CyPhi also has a floor called SLURP, which stands for the Sustainable Living Undergraduate Research Project. SLURP is dedicated to student research about sustainable living on the Santa Clara University campus.

SCOOPS (Students Collaborating and Organizing Opportunities and Projects for Sustainability) empowers Santa Clara University students in leadership positions to implement the University's Strategic Plan by fostering Justice and Sustainability programs among student organizations. Liaisons engage their organization's members in sustainable behaviors in order to develop a culture of sustainability among students at SCU.

The Center for Sustainability organizes a number of annual events for the campus community. These events help students, faculty, and staff learn more about sustainability, and how to get involved on campus.

Bronco Urban Gardens (BUG), an environmental justice initiative, is a partnership between Santa Clara University's Center for Sustainability and the Silicon Valley HealthCorps. The goal of the program is to increase community food security, sustainability, and environmental literacy in Santa Clara Country through the co-creation and technical support of urban gardens and garden education programs.

More websites:
Student Organizations:
http://scu.edu/csl/organizations/rso.cfm
http://law.scu.edu/life/saldf/