The Office of Sustainability Initiatives (OSI) awarded six Emory affiliates the Sustainability Innovator award for their dedication to sustainability related projects.

OSI awarded Jane Duggan, anesthesiologist at Emory University Hospital Midtown and an assistant professor of anesthesiology in the School of Medicine; Kyle Griffith, complex director for Few and Evans Residence Halls; Kirk Hines, registered horticultural therapist; Raghu Patil, senior program associate in the Office of Finance and Operations at Oxford College; Randy Sims, director of facilities management at Emory University Hospital Midtown; and Leah Yngve, a second-year student at Rollins School of Public Health.

According to OSI Sustainability Programs Coordinator Emily Cumbie-Drake, the OSI nominates individuals for the awards annually in the fall. The OSI staff selects final recipients.

Cumbie-Drake added that the OSI tries to split up the awards equally among students, faculty and staff. Each recipient is honored with a plaque containing a photo of a sustainability-related image.

The recipients, the OSI website states, are awarded for the time and effort they put into furthering Emory University’s goal of maintaining a sustainable college campus through various avenues such as education, waste reduction and energy conservation.

According to Cumbie-Drake, these awards are important to the community because they recognize individuals outside of the Office of Sustainability who implement sustainable projects while inspiring others to do the same.

The award was renamed the Robert S. Hascall Sustainability Innovator Award in 2010 to honor Bob Hascall, who led the University’s Campus Services, according to the OSI website.

According to the website, Hascall championed sustainability initiatives at Emory and put great effort into implementing programs that reflected these goals, including the construction of the first Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for Existing Buildings (LEED-EB) Gold building in the U.S.

Leah Yngve, second-year student at Rollins School of Public Health, received the award this year for her effort in making both Emory and Atlanta bike-friendly and changing people’s perceptions of Atlanta as a city a person cannot bike in, according to Yngve.

“It was a complete surprise when I was notified that I’d be receiving [the award] and very rewarding,” Yngve said.

Another recipient of the award, Kirk Hines, is a horticultural therapist at Emory’s Wesley Woods Hospital and said he was honored to receive the award.

Hines said he has spent the last 20 years developing the Horticultural Therapy program at the hospital.

He added that the program allows patients to plant, sow and ultimately take home vegetables, herbs and flowers that they grew themselves as a form of therapy.

Hines said some of the plants are donated to Emory’s Educational Gardens, giving great pleasure to the patients who, Hines said, enjoy knowing that the plants they grew were going to teach sustainability and a love of gardening.

Yngve said she is currently working on a bicycle and pedestrian road safety audit of North Decatur and Clifton that will make the area safer for people that are not traveling in cars.

Hines, on the other hand, said he will be moving his horticulture therapy program to A.G. Rhodes Health and Rehab, a non-profit in Atlanta, due to the program being cut, effective Nov. 1.

– Contact Naomi Maisel at namaise@emory.edu

 
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