Research Symposium
The Sustainable Development Goals Undergraduate Research Group (SURG) presented our first-ever Fall 2020 SURG Research Symposium, on Monday, December 7th via Zoom. See for yourself what our student researchers had to share about their research and how they incorporated the UN SDGs!
Centering Environmental Justice in UCB Sustainability Report
The SURG Environmental Justice group is identifying opportunities for the University of California, Berkeley to center environmental justice in their annual sustainability report. The project is outlined in 3 main phases:
- (1) Analysis of current sustainability reports to identify strengths and weaknesses in how environmental justice is framed
- (2) Research other sustainability reports to serve as sources of inspiration
- (3) Create specific, actionable recommendations adopting an environmental justice framework
We hope to instill a value of environmentalism based on equity and justice in our campus community as well as generate a broader institutional commitment to environmental justice in administrative sustainability decision-making. We are one of the two research teams involved in the Global University Climate Forum with the results of our research being published in the report to the 2021 United Nations Climate Conference (COP26).
Committee Lead: Varsha Madapoosi
Pictured (Left to Right):
Top Row: Jade Pannetier, Chloe Olsen; Middle Row: Daisy Chu, Jakob Evans; Bottom Row: Varsha Madapoosi, Hayley Lai
Academic Mentor: Kira Stoll
Analyzing Economic Resiliency during the COVID-19 Pandemic with Regard to Local Businesses in the City of Berkeley
During the 2020 Fall Semester, we worked on addressing the impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on local businesses in the City of Berkeley and the San Francisco East Bay. To understand how the local economy was affected by the pandemic, we focused on the following main questions: How harshly the local economy was affected? What and how have external relief programs alleviated local business’ concerns? What are the resiliency efforts of local businesses?
In addition to these foundational questions, we took a closer look at two main topic areas:
- The impact of the pandemic on food security
- Racial discrepancies in economic resiliency
Committee Lead: Kung Chen
Pictured (Left to Right):
Top Row: Kung Chen, Annie Miller; Middle: Brianna Ong; Bottom Row: Weiping Huang, Britney Wu
Academic Mentor: Manaswini Rao
Connecting California’s 2020 Wildfires to Climate Change
Our project is a year-long research group focusing on studying the link between the recent 2020 California Wildfires and climate change. We are one of the two groups in SURG who are lucky to be a part of the Global University Climate Forum, and the results of our research will be published in the report to the 2021 United Nations Climate Conference (COP26). In our studies, we aim to learn about the capacity that the University of California, Berkeley, and its parent city have in responding to wildfires. We are aiming to publish both an Academic Research Paper and a Berkeley Wildfire Vulnerability Assessment
Committee Lead: Rohith Moolakatt
Pictured (Left to Right):
Top Row: Joyce Wang, Ava Currie, Grace Huang Bottom Row: Emma Centeno, Rohith Moolakatt, Amit Sant, Scott Hashimoto
Academic Mentor: Professor Amm Quamruzzaman