GCI – Green Campus Initiative at University of Chicago

Green Campus Initiative is the leading environmental student organization at the University of Chicago Campus. 

Working through student events, university departments, and our own events and actions, GCI seeks to promote sustainability in all aspects of campus life. The main mechanism of GCI are pods, which tackle specific initiatives.  Pods are largely autonomous in that determine their own leadership and how their issues will be tackled.  This allows for the maximum motivation and the most flexible structure to get things done.

Previous and current pod projects include a campaign to eliminate plastic water bottles on campus, expanding community gardens to educate the student body, setting up informative vegetarian potlucks, putting on community service events relating to the environment, composting at student and university events both large and small, recycling at fraternities after their parties, and performig audits and investigations to determine that university waste policies are carried out. Environmental activism we leave to UChicago Climate Action Network, which grew up as a pod and has now spun off into its own student group.

Some of our major events include No Trash Bash in the fall, a lively event showcasing environmental initiatives and groups on and off campus, and Battle of the Bulbs in the spring, an interdormitory energy reduction competition.

• Visit our website (really blog) to stay up to date with our latest efforts!