By SHANNON O. WELLS

Pitt Sustainability’s Earth Month, rooted in the 56-year-old Earth Day celebrated annually on April 22, is enhanced by spring warmth and colorfully popping vegetation, but planning for campus events and activities requires significant thought and action.

“For Earth Month preparation, we started much earlier this year than previous years that I’ve been here,” said Laura Jellum, assistant director of marketing and communications in the Office of Finance and Operations. “We started in late fall (2025) and basically put together a committee to talk about Earth Month events and worked through that process over the next couple months to solidify the Earth Month calendar.”

By late winter-early spring, Earth Month planning moves to the front burner for Jellum and others, including Emily Potoczny, the Office of Sustainability’s engagement manager.

“Certainly, by March we’ve confirmed all our events and details. We create basically a big calendar of what’s going on … and then launch it the week before April starts,” Jellum said. “This year we really tried to — instead of creating a lot of new events — work with what was already happening, especially looking at what’s been popular in the past.”

Jellum said for her, Earth Month events provide “the opportunity to look at our community and our neighborhood with fresh eyes.”

Collaborators with Pitt Sustainability on events and activities include Student Affairs, Community Engagement and Health Sciences, among others.

“It’s really kind of an inter-departmental effort for us to make sure that we are covering as many events as possible,” she noted.

As a result, Earth Month 2026 offers numerous opportunities to get involved across campus, from the Eco Artisans Showcase and Arbor Day celebrations that happened earlier this month to the Pitt Sustainability Awards and Spring Sustainability Symposium on April 24 and the academic year wrap-up, “Move Out Clean Out” (formerly “Clutter for a Cause”), from April 29 through May 3.

“For this year, there were actually a couple of new things,” Jellum noted, including the Health Sciences Sustainability Film Festival on April 3 (click here for winners and finalists), and the Eco Artisans Art Fair put on by the Student Office of Sustainability.

“It’s basically creating art out of environmentally friendly or repurposed materials,” Jellum said, noting there’s a “huge, cool display over at William Pitt Union of all the art that’s been created.”

Pitt also renewed its Tree Campus certification from the Arbor Day Foundation by meeting the five core standards for sustainable campus forestry required by Tree Campus Higher Education:

Establishing a campus tree advisory committee

Developing a campus tree care plan

Dedicating annual expenditures for tree care

Observing Arbor Day 

Sponsoring service-learning projects, such as campus Tree Treks and “Trees as Social Determinants of Health” talk.

Sustainability also collaborated with the Center for Creativity on a vinyl banner reworking workshop that involved transforming vinyl banners into tote bags and other items. “Anything that’s kind of cool and tactile are usually very popular,” Jellum said.

Arbor Day activities on April 16 included a Tree Walk and a talk about why trees are important to our health.

Upcoming events

Earth Month events still to come include the Environmental Discourse Speakeasy and University Club Terrace Planting, from 4 to 6 p.m. April 21, from 4-6 p.m. in the University Club’s Gold Room and Terrace.

Convening to advance strategies for effective environmental communication and drawing on interdisciplinary perspectives, the Environmental Discourse Working Group developed a shared set of key words aimed to deepen the Pitt community’s collective understanding of sustainability.

The event will offer insights from the sessions and information about future directions. Guests are then invited to continue the conversation on the Terrace from 5 to 6 p.m. for an herb planting and complimentary plant‑based happy hour. Herbs will be planted in compostable pots for participants to take home and grow through the summer. Reserve your spot at bit.ly/SpringSpeakeasy2026.

Those who want to get a jump on Earth Day itself can celebrate Earth Day Eve at the University Club on April 21 through a full day of what Sustainability calls “engaging, feel-good experiences” centered on wellness, sustainability and community, including hands-on kitchen workshops and fresh samplings to “energizing movement sessions and relaxing rooftop moments.”

The annual Pitt Sustainability Awards ceremony and Spring Student Sustainability Symposium will take place from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. April 24, in the William Pitt Union.

The annual event, which started in 2015, recognizes Pitt faculty, staff, students and groups who make an “extraordinary impact” on campus sustainability, Pitt Sustainability said, demonstrating their impact in one or more categories of the Pitt Sustainability Plan — Stewardship, Exploration, and/or Community and Culture — via “ideas, talents and passions that contribute to a thriving culture of sustainability.”

This year’s events are:

9-9:30 a.m.: Continental breakfast and welcoming remarks (Lower Lounge)

9:45-11:50 a.m.: Concurrent student presentations in the Kurtzman Room, Assembly Room, and Ballroom

Noon-1:30 p.m.: Lunch and Pitt Sustainability Awards program (Lower Lounge)

1:45-3 p.m.: Networking session

“Our Pitt Sustainability awards are a really big deal for us every year,” Jellum noted. “Each April we honor people across the University for their achievements and contributions to sustainability.”

Cleanup time

Toward the end of Earth Month, Pitt Sustainability helps make spring cleaning easy with “Move Out Clean Out!” (formerly “Clutter for a Cause”) from April 29 through May 3. Items including furniture, electronics and decor are collected and donated to various organizations.

Students can drop off clean, usable dorm essentials at donation stations across campus, keeping usable items out of landfills and putting them to use for those who need them. Also, this year shoppers can buy donated items on the spot at the Schenley Quad Tent during open hours.

The donated items go to Thriftsburgh and other nonprofits across Pittsburgh, Jellum said, noting the popular event was rebranded “because we didn’t think the name described what the event was .… Move Out, Clean Out seemed a little bit more straightforward.”

Donation stations include the following:

Schenley Quad Tent (between Amos and McCormick halls)

Litchfield Towers Lobby (across from Panther Central)

Sutherland Hall Tent (in the Sutherland Hall “U” Parking Lot behind the building)

Click here to volunteer.

Noting Earth Day’s continued resonance since the inaugural one in July 1970, Jellum said the concept “really resonated” with her when she first heard of it while in elementary school.

“It was one of the first events that I knew of, as a young person who eventually became an environmentalist, that celebrated the Earth and why it was important to us,” she said. “It felt like kind of a no-brainer to me when I first heard about it. And I’m really happy that it has become more part of our lexicon.”

Despite ongoing environmental and climate-related challenges, she said the event remains vital and effective as a portal to education, awareness and involvement.

“We are hopefully thinking about what our impact is on the planet and how it can change for the better if we practice better habits and activities and just appreciate what we have around us,” she said. “I think Pitt has a beautiful campus, lots of nature and obviously trees, and we take good care of how our campus looks in an urban environment.”

Shannon O. Wells is a writer for the University Times. Reach him at shannonw@pitt.edu.

 

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