From raging wildfires and record-breaking heat waves to devastating floods, climate change is a crisis unfolding before our eyes. Urgency for change is growing and universities are increasingly being pressured to take bold actions. At Cornell, students and faculty are stepping up to make those changes.
According to members of the organization Cornell on Fire, “Cornell’s climate action plan is deeply inadequate because it preserves current levels of elite consumption while proposing ‘solutions’ that rely on ‘offsets’ or substitutions.”
Because of this, they set out to write a climate resolution along with the Student Assembly Environmental Committee and capstone course students Jenna Bea Saevitzon, Sierra Burror, Marissa Brucker, and their instructor Professor Marianne Krasny. On December 5 2024, this resolution, which seeks to hold the University accountable to its climate goals, was passed in a unanimous vote by the Cornell Student Assembly.
The resolution proposes many measures, including seeking a full- time university president committed to addressing the campus and community’s climate-related issues, committing to halve the current carbon emissions by 2030, actively shifting away campus policies from high carbon activities, and advocating for climate equity.
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