Sustainability Nexus: Uniting Green Philly & Pop-up Tomorrow

This guest post comes from Nicole Koedyker, Sierra Club President at Drexel.

Are you interested in sustainability? Do you like working alongside people who have similar interests but are a telecommuter or student? In addition to being a senior at Drexel University, I also work for the Sustainability NEXUS, a non-profit organization that is working to bring together this target audience and others to collaborate on sustainability initiatives in the Greater Philadelphia Area.

If you’ve ever Googled to find a group of people interested in urban agriculture, storm water management, sustainable business, conservation, or anything else related to the environmental movement, you’ve probably come across hundreds, if not thousands, of groups and organizations nationally and regionally. Sustainability NEXUS hopes to bring like-minded groups and individuals together to coalesce those efforts of the hundreds of organizations into a more concentrated movement.

Think of it like a bunch of tiny marbles all over Philly, some may be bigger than others. But as they roll through the streets, they may make an impact on someone slipping on one or two on their way home or some will fall into multitude of potholes in the streets or down the storm drains (not environmentally friendly!). Now if we melt all those glass marbles together (which accuracy is questionable chemically or scientifically…), we’ll get a huge, glass globe the size of a large semi-truck. Maybe we’ll place it in the Navy Yard, Rittenhouse Square, or University City and anywhere it’ll be, it will demand attention and will have a larger effect than a bunch of small marbles. That’s the idea of the Sustainability NEXUS- a nexus of smaller efforts aggregated to represent the entire sustainability movement.

Through social media and a widespread website presence, the NEXUS will be a one-stop shop for all things sustainability in Philadelphia whether its event promotion or educational information about projects. Along with the web feature is the future coworking and event space of the NEXUS where organizations and individuals can attend a workshop, host a gala, cowork, and many other things while still being in the presence of eco-friendly colleagues.

Learn more about the Sustainability NEXUS and cowork, ‘dowork’, or network (definitions below) with like-minded individuals at our first Coworking Pop-Up on Tuesday, May 7 (9 AM-4 PM) at Good Karma Café on 10^th & Pine. Bring some work to do, some ideas for a project that you’d like to collaborate on, and/or just come to meet new people with similar interests all over a fair trade, organic cup of coffee!

• Coworking = a style of work that involves a shared working environment, often an office, and independent activity. Unlike in a typical office environment, those coworking are usually not employed by the same organization.
• Doworking = Going to a more public place than your couch (usually a coffee shop) to do work, though not necessarily to interact with other people.
• Networking = Meeting new people.

I hope to see you on Tuesday. To stay in the loop of all Sustainability NEXUS and green related things, follow us on Facebook and Twitter!