Article on the UW Environment Network

Meeting of the UW greens
Cross-campus network created to share resources
Sabrina Bowman - Imprint staff
Student groups at UW that are concerned about the environment have decided to connect through the creation of an environmental network called UWEN (the University of Waterloo Environment Network).
"There are so many groups [on campus] striving towards the same thing... [we wanted to] get everyone together to see if we have common ground. We can be stronger working together," said University of Waterloo Sustainability Project (UWSP) coordinator Hingman Leung.
Leung, along with Darcy Higgins, president of the UW campus greens, contacted environmentally-focused groups on campus, including the environmental studies society, Engineers Without Borders, the Waterloo Public Interest Research Group and several others about getting involved in the network.
The aim is to connect the different green groups on campus so that they can share ideas, resources and volunteers, as well as seek help with any problems they encounter.
"We want to work as a network - keep our individual groups but work together on one project, which would be stronger - and avoid duplication of projects," added Higgins.
Present at the meeting were representatives from the UW Campus Greens, UWSP, the planning students society, the environment and resource studies student association and the science society.
Some of the possible activities proposed at the UWEN meeting include a letter-writing campaign to the university to push them to hire a sustainability coordinator and a coffeehouse event to allow the members of the network to connect face to face.
The network will be made up of representatives from any groups on campus interested in environmental issues and activism. There will be monthly meetings and an e-mail list, on which questions, volunteer opportunities and general updates will be posted.
"We are going to have such a variety of societies and people [who join the network], so we are going to have more cross-campus involvement; and we will be able to reach people on a more intimate level," said science society representative Andrew Falcao.
For more information on the network and how you can get your campus group involved in UWEN, e-mail uwenet@gmail.com.