Sydney Sustainability Club

The imperative for Australia to embark upon a green transition has become evident. This is two-fold. Firstly, for a large scale transition to happen, we need all hands on deck. The society needs its citizens to be literate on topics of sustainability and climate change, make good decisions and create their unique impact. And secondly, a large talent pool will need to be trained to meet an increased demand in areas such as renewable energy, science, engineering, supply chain and consulting. Students will also need to be more educated about their sustainability graduate pathways early on in their degree so that they understand their opportunities early on. We believe that no matter which industry students decide to go in, whether it is directly linked with emission reduction or not, every student can and will have a role to play towards the mission of creating a more sustainable future. The Sydney Sustainability Club will be established with the aim to help students, groups, or organisations with finding their unique piece of the puzzle to tackle the most important challenge of our time. We wish to build a community of students and strengthen their confidence to make an impact through education, tightening the university-industry connection and amplifying Sustainable Development Goals on campus.

The opportunities we see:

1. Sustainability needs to be normalised, students need to be more informed and educated on current topics and integrate sustainable practices as part of their daily lives and personal value
2. Sustainability is a growing industry where more jobs are being created and even in roles that might not be directly linked to emission reduction, students need to know that there are also ways to combine their expertise with contributing to sustainability
3. Usyd is having more sustainability courses, (major, minor) and even a master’s degree, so there will be more students in the field that wants to learn more about their graduate pathways and opportunities

We wish to do this by achieving the following objectives:

1. Establishing industry connections – where people can learn more about their future opportunities in sustainability
2. Education – increasing awareness on relevant topics and making sustainability people’s daily habits/ value through content creation on social media
3. Building a community – a community of students in the field connected by interest to create a positive impact
4. Amplifying USYD sustainability initiatives/ promoting relevant courses

We have the objective to eventually amplify SDG on campus by collaborating with other societies and hosting events that adhere to the SDG such as wellness, equality waste reduction and so on.

We are multidisciplinary and we can three main targeted groups:
1. Students from all disciplines with an interest in learning more about sustainability
2. Students from all disciplines with an interest to develop a career in sustainability or wishes to learn how they can weave sustainability values into their career
3. Students with a Master of Sustainability or with a Major or Minor in Sustainability