Students Advancing Food Equity (SAFE), a campus organization dedicated to combating food insecurity, joined forces with other Georgetown University and D.C. student organizations to create the D.C. Student Sustainability Network (DCSSC), which aims to centralize environmental activism in Washington, D.C.
DCSSC, led by Urban Beet, an organization that combats food insecurity by building gardens in underserved D.C. communities, is a network for organizations and individuals interested in climate justice, agriculture, sustainability and food security.
Members of DCSSC hope to consolidate environmental activism efforts to achieve a greater impact, according to Urban Beet Director of Outreach and Communications Stephanie Munn.
“With the DCSSC we aim to create a collaborative virtual space in which we can share ideas, events, and resources,” Munn wrote in an email to The Hoya. “While we hope that this group self-generates content through posts, as we expand, we plan to host speaker panels and networking events on topics of interest for the students. The goal is to connect like-minded people, increase idea-sharing within the environmentalist community, and attack climate change on a systemic level.”
The network provides an opportunity for students interested in sustainability and food justice to get involved in activism, according to SAFE co-president Christina Rosamond (SFS ’24).
“I know people at Georgetown are always looking for ways to give back in different volunteer opportunities to get involved with, so I think this is a great place for students to who are passionate about these issues to come in and find ways to begin to think about that and resolve them and hopefully make some lasting change in our community,” Rosamond said.
DCSSC is open to all Georgetown students, and interested individuals can join through a Facebook page.
Georgetown Renewable Energy and Environmental Network (GREEN) is also participating in DCSSC in an effort to expand upon Georgetown’s recent environmental initiatives, like the Earth Commons Institute, a platform for the study of environmental stewardship and sustainability, according to Mark Kuo (COL ’24), treasurer of GREEN and co-lead of the Georgetown community garden.
“When Urban Beet sought to expand its D.C. network, we were one of their first contacts and were more than happy to connect them to other organizations at GWU and Georgetown,” Kuo wrote. “As Georgetown expands its reach with the Earth Commons Institute, GREEN also seeks to develop undergraduate influence in D.C.’s broader environmental efforts.”
The network also provides a way to streamline collaboration between different student groups, according to Munn.
“I came up with the collective when, while reaching out to different student groups to hire farm managers, I saw how interested other young people were in the earth, agriculture, and food security,” Munn said. “I wanted to connect all of these groups within individual universities and throughout D.C. because I believe that global issues such as climate justice and food security are more likely to be solved by working together.
The collaboration between DCSSC and SAFE will be mutually beneficial, according to Rosamond.
“The network will expand as we keep growing SAFE,” Rosamond said. “It’s kind of hard for us as an organization to have a big platform of members right now just because our volunteer opportunities are kind of ad hoc, like if you want to do a food rescue here and there.”
DCSSC is part of SAFE’s efforts to increase collaboration with more organizations, thus increasing food justice in the Georgetown and D.C. community, according to Rosamond.
“We hope to introduce community gardening with GREEN,” Rosamond said. “That’ll benefit impoverished areas and that’s kind of one of our goals, working towards food security in D.C.”
