Green Office at Maastricht University
The Green Office was set up in 2010 by a group of students and staff members passionate about sustainability, after their proposal was positively received by the management of the university. Since then we have been consistently building a track record of successes, while learning from mistakes. The Green Office is a student-driven university department that is responsible for managing Maastricht University’s sustainability portfolio.
Objectives
- initiates and coordinates sustainability projects by empowering students and staff members
- facilitate the cultural transformation by as well as of the community to reach sustainable development
Main Activities
- reducing negative environmental and social impacts
- learning about its own sustainability performance
- enhancing awareness about sustainability, to further student engagement and to promote sustainable behavior of students and staff.
- further integrating sustainability into the curriculum while building the necessary competencies of students to move the sustainability transition forward
- increasing knowledge exchange between researchers across faculties and to support and enhance opportunities for student research on sustainability-related questions
Results
Empowering students and staff to act as effective change agents in the transformation of the university and in society at large. Green Office seeks to cultivate among the UM community a sense of agency, as well as the competencies required for effective action for change. We, the members of Green Office, invite students, academics and UM staff to work with us so that, together, we will succeed in making Maastricht University sustainable from within and thereby become a transformational actor in society.
Acting as intra-preneurs, or embedded change agents, who use innovative approaches to change the organization they are themselves a part of. As a department of UM, Green Office can leverage this unique position to mobilize the community of UM students, academics and staff and facilitate their efforts in the sustainability transformation of the university.
Playing an integrator role, through connecting student initiatives and bridging the gaps between departments and different stakeholder groups. This means integrating the research, education and operational activities in line with sustainability goals. Also, this involves mediating between the change-efforts of students and the university. Thereby, the bottom-up demand for change and creative ideas of students and staff can be more easily met by the actors with the power to implement decisions.