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Aerielle Rojas, Fashion Technology student and Student Sustainability Architect, talks us through her work with the Sustainability Service on delivering sustainability careers events for students.

Coming from another country to pursue fashion sustainability was something I was prepared to do. But to take an opportunity, in my first year, to implement sustainability among my fellow peers and University staff caught me by surprise. My name is Aerielle Rojas, I am a first-year Fashion Technology student and am honoured to be one of this year’s Student Sustainability Architects.

My project this year is focused on a series of events titled ‘The Sustainability Journey’, which are sustainability career workshops open to students. Originally founded by a University of Leeds Masters student, these events are a collaboration with the Institute for Environmental Management and Assessment (IEMA).

The events are intended to facilitate discussion between guest professionals and students on how sustainability is implemented into their careers. However, I realised after conversations with the founder and attending other speaker sessions that careers within sustainability tended to focus on a select number of disciplines. The students from the School of Earth and Environment or from science-related studies were regular attendees of The Sustainability Journey’s previous events, but that was only a fraction of our student population. It was an even smaller representation of the diverse academic disciplines and professional fields we explored on campus.

I thought, ‘How can we differentiate the Sustainability Journey from other career panels?’ From a student who has attended such events at the School of Design, I understand that we students want to know the details of what it's like going into our respective fields. And, instead of going to separate design and sustainability events, I thought it would be valuable to combine the ideas and host more discipline-specific sustainability workshops. For example, hosting a session that highlights professionals implementing sustainability from the food industry, or professionals from engineering who innovate within their roles. Working to host the first events this year, The Sustainability Journey now can have the potential to reach a wider audience of interests and facilitate more curated discussions. Long term, I hope to incorporate Sustainability Journey into the Leeds Sustainable Curriculum amongst our diverse Faculties, along with other scheduled career programs.

Beyond my project, I am excited to celebrate the university’s progress towards honouring sustainability and look forward to the accomplishments we all will create.

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