"Make it look like a duck..." or The Falsification of Sustainability

Courtesy of Brimen Cartoons

I have seen this all too often. A company makes an announcement of their intentions, the speech littered with hot button words,and in the end we all feel warm and fuzzy at the progress we're promised.  Fast forward some time and it seems more often than not these companies show little progress, if not backwards movement. Was it a lie? Was it a misunderstanding? How is it that we have been talking about Sustainability for over a decade, with so little to show for it?  I believe it all boils down to what we choose to call Sustainable, more specifically, how many things we call Sustainable.  Slapping labels on things, doesn't actually make them so.  

We are Champions at work!

Hey everyone!

So I apologize for not issuing my second installment of This Week in Sustainability, I hope you liked it, I sure did! Check it out here!

I tried to write up a little something Friday night, but I was wiped out from a day's worth of competition.  I will provide a write up soon on this as well, but in brief, Los Angeles Trade and Technical College participated in and totally rocked the State Level of Skills USA in San Diego!

In an impressive sweep, our school pulled in 10 gold medals, as well as getting 4th place in  highest membership growth, earning the title of Mega Chapter!

This Week in Sustainability: 03/22-03/29

So in our effort to stay relevant we have decided to pay more attention to the news.  It's important to understand what others are doing, and to see the whole picture as well as the details.  So without further ado, I present to you the Sustainabilty Club's first installment of what I hope to be a weekly publication.

This Week in Sustainability 

"Portland argues the definition of "Sustainable."

From: All Things Writing

This week's Portland Business Journal is taking a stab at symantix, as it debates what it really means to be "Sustainable."  As many logicians would tell you definition is key to correct debate, so I'm interested to see their outcome.  I have personally felt for a while now that the term has been overused and underexplained; or in  some cases abused for the sake of business or politics.  As Ecotrust President Astrid Scholz puts it, “You don’t have to care about ‘sustainability’ to use it,” she said. “You can attract dumb capital, so to speak, just by virtue of getting a financial return and getting it to do the right thing.”¹  

Following nature's path: A brief introduction

From: Biomimicry.net

Bio-mimicry is an innovative process inspired by nature to seek sustainable solutions to many of mother earth’s problems. It is a method of emulating natures design process by discovering the genetic  DNA code of mimicking its structure and design models. According to Janine Benyus, “bio-mimicry is the conscious emulation of life’s genius by taking the design principles and the genius of the natural world and learning something from it."

Career day at Jefferson Highschool

Yesterday the Sustainable Architecture club joined several colleges and universities at Jefferson High School to promote our college and give a little insight into what our class does and hopes to achieve. Our station provided High School students with "seed bombs" with the idea of making your environment a nicer place; while Isai's station provided knowledge about kinetic energy and it's different uses. Our two stations were recognized by Jefferson High, inviting us back for another event gathering approximately two months from now!

We seek to find more events like these and others to get the name of our Sustainability club out in the world. If you would like to be part of this our know of events, please let us know and your help will be greatly appreciated!

Written by Ernesto Aguilar
Edited by Ian Salamanca
Photos by Isabel Arroyo

Something Sustainable this way comes

Yes, we are once again going to tip on the hard hat and buckle down this blog and give it the fine tuning it deserves.  Trimming the fat, alternating the fonts, a new color scheme and a (hopefully) better mobile version- oh and a redux twitter.

I'm doing this now, to make way for a new assistant Editor, and a couple contributors.  The idea being that we could start producing more content by having options.  There will be a competition for who gets the spot, so stay tuned to meet the deary eyed hopefuls!

Besides that we have been competing left and right, as well as teaching and learning; but I'll leave that post to the side until the dust chips settle.

Thanks for bearing with us.

Update: This blog can now be found at http://www.sustainableARC.blogspot.com
Update: Follow us @SustainableARC
Drop us a text, or call to: (612) 787-2721 or (612) Sus-Arc1
and for our G+ page please subscribe to: gplus.to/sustainableARCclub

It's a New Year! Let's start it off RIGHT!

Clockwise from Left:  Isai German, Raphael Lavine Jr. ,
Hildemar Cruz, Professor Marcela Oliva, Martin Saunders,
John Snelling, Isabel Arroyo. Not Pictured: Ian Salamanca

Good Day Everyone!

That's right! We're BACK!  Since the end of the semester we have scheduled random meetings among our board members to keep ourselves focused for the work to come.  The day after Christmas we got together on Google+ Hangouts and discussed our upcoming involvement with a design competition known as Skills USA, which we are lucky enough to be hosting at our college!  More to come regarding this! Then on Monday, Jan 7th we met in the Historic Figueroa Hotel for our first official meeting of the year.  It was a refreshing experience to be talking about Architecture in a setting as this, as opposed to simply in the classroom.  We liked the experience so much we are considering holding meetings in other local landmarks.

It's hard to believe you're in LA

 Followed two days later with the first, of many more enlightening field trips.  We feel it's important to be connected to one's community, and our community has had a lot of hardships, but it is in no means a dire place.  As our club president, Isai German recounts:

An interesting Harmonograph

The Sustainable Architecture club took a tour of the Inner City Arts, a non-profit organization with spaces and classes available to the community.  The architect, Michael Maltzan,  had the neighborhood in mind when designing the location and had programmed the site for growth.  With transparent walls and corridors visible from the street, the campus has a welcoming sensation even in the heart of this outskirted community.  All of the buildings are clean of graffiti, which goes to prove that the community supports this effort of art education.  The spaces nurture several types of art from performance to animation. The species of trees that encompass the land softens the sound pollution of the city and creates an urban forest.  The scale of the operations are such that they are supported with generous donations from the Annenberg Foundation, Disney and others.  To understand the our community  and bridge the arts to those who need them, Inner CIty Arts is a beacon of hope for the under served.

Beautiful spaces facilitate bright minds

Trips like this help us round out our learning, by exposing us to the good work of other local Architects.  We plan to have many more this coming year and will keep you informed!  On a related note, if you have a suggestion for our next learning trip please let us know in the comments section below!  Until then, it's good to be back and I can't wait to tell y'all of our plans for the start of the semester!

-Cheers