Our Commitment to Action
Washington University is committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions 22% by 2020. To advance this goal, the university has established an Energy Conservation Investment of $30 million.
CGI U 2013 was at Washington University in St. Louis from April 5-7, 2013, bringing together nearly 1,200 attendees to make a difference in CGI U’s five focus areas: education, environment and climate change, peace and human rights, poverty alleviation, and public health.
WUSTL volunteers pave the way for CGI U large-scale service project
More than 250 students, faculty, staff and friends from across the university gathered at Gateway STEM High School last Saturday, March 30, to help lay the groundwork for this weekend’s… Keep reading →
Photos
To download hi-res images please visit the WUSTL Flickr account.
Why Washington University?
Public service and global leadership are at the heart of the mission of Washington University in St. Louis. Our students, faculty and staff are leading the way to address urgent global challenges in the CGI’s five focus areas: education, environment and climate change, peace and human rights, poverty alleviation and public health.
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Student Commitments
Commitments to Action are new, specific, and measurable initiatives that address social or environmental challenges on campuses, in communities, or in different parts of the world. Proposed by an individual or a group, commitments translate practical goals into meaningful and measurable results. WUSTL is proud of all 200 of our students who have made a commitment to action through CGI U. Here is a sample of the projects our students are working on.
D*Serves (Design Serves)
D*Serve (Design Serves) aims to inspire youth who live in disinvested neighborhoods by providing them experience and education in design and civic leadership. The idea is to help teens first identify what exactly it is they want – and deserve – in their community, and then guide them toward reinvigorating culture, socio-economy, and physical spaces through sustainable innovations.
Collaboration through education: Bridging our classrooms, environment, and communities
Using the connecting classrooms model from UNICEF, this project hopes to connect high school youth (ages 14-18) in St. Louis, Missouri, Andavadoaka, Madagascar, and Indonesia through an online platform to build international collaboration on environmental issues.
Interactive Living Landscape
In cities throughout the world, years of contamination have rendered large swaths of land unfit for habitation, development or food production. Interactive Living Landscape aims to demonstrate that vacant urban lots can be productively landscaped in ways that not only heal the soil, but also help improve the health of the wider community.
Mobile Hand Clinic for St. Louisans
This plan aims to bring a mobile hand clinic to medically underserved St. Louisans. It calls for simple tools, treatments and education for those with untreated hand conditions.
Bringing Sight to Villa El Salvador
This plan aims to outfit a community health clinic in Villa El Salvador, Peru with a basic eye-care unit as a solution to the community's unaddressed visual health needs. To ensure the sustainability of the program, the clinic will be provided with 500 adjustable-prescription glasses and several of the clinic's nurses will be trained in performing eye exams.
Green Light St. Louis
Green Light St. Louis, an extension of Green Light New Orleans, replaces incandescent light bulbs with compact florescent light bulbs (CFLs) in low-income households for free. By installing CFLs in homes that could not afford to switch otherwise, Green Light St. Louis shows that a movement of individual actions can significantly impact families’ lives and the environment.
Correctional Education Reform Through Technology
The goal of the Correctional Education Reform Through Technology program is to equip the inmates of St. County Jail and St. Louis County Juvenile Detention with the literacy, mathematics, and critical thinking skills necessary in order to obtain their GEDs and reduce their rate of relapse.
Team LumaCure
Team LumaCure has identified one of the most significant factors that contribute towards neonatal deaths — hyperbilirubinemia, or jaundice. The team’s goal is to make a low cost and portable phototherapeutic treatment device that will help treat neonatal jaundice using Electroluminescence instead of the existing LED / halogen lamp phototherapy solutions. The team has been researching and thinking about this problem, and feels it has come up with a better, cheaper solution that is not currently available.
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Join the Conversation
We are using Storify to curate the preparations, applications, and energy leading up to CGI U at Washington University in April, 2013. Be a part of the conversation! Tweet, post to Facebook and Tumblr, or send us links to blogs. Help us build the story for Washington University and CGI U.
Find Us Online
Participate
While CGI U sessions are not open to the public, everyone has the opportunity to engage in a number of ways. You can:
- Watch sessions live at cgiu.org,
- Follow us on Tumblr to get the the WUSTL Eye View of CGI U,
- Share your thoughts by using #CGIU on Twitter and Tumblr, and
- Participate in WUSTL sustainability efforts.
Campus Viewing Parties
Everyone is welcome to attend a live feed of the CGI U sessions featuring President Bill Clinton and TV personality Stephen Colbert in Tisch Commons on the DUC movie screen. Additional sessions will be presented in the DUC Fun Room.
April 5, 6:30 p.m.
Opening Session by President Bill Clinton
April 6, 3:30 p.m.
Closing Remarks by Stephen Colbert
Media Access
Press registration is now open to members of the media. To apply, please complete the press access form on the CGI U website.
Schedule of Events
CGI U 2013 Meeting Agenda
For the complete participant details and meeting agenda, including plenary sessions, skill and working sessions, and the service project, visit cgiu.org.
