Green Threads - Sustainability Across the Curriculum
The spring 2026 workshop will take place on May 13th and 14th on the UM Mountain Campus.
Want to be a part of the AY26/27 Sustainability Across the Curriculum cohort? Apply by April 6, 2026!
What is GREEN THREAD?
Green Thread is a two-day workshop designed to broaden instructors' understanding of sustainability, introduce "threads" of sustainability education into existing courses, and support the development of new sustainability courses at UM. Workshop activities include presentations from local and regional professionals on a variety of sustainability topics, past Green Thread participants' examples of course modifications and teaching experience, and abundant resources and materials to support inclusion of sustainability themes in a variety of academic disciplines. Participants will be asked to bring a course for modification and will have ample time to brainstorm and workshop with each other. Any UM faculty, instructor, or graduate student instructor is eligible to participate.
Participants should plan to attend the entire workshop as it has been designed with two days of content and exercises intentionally. Lunch and snacks will be provided both days. Peter McDonough, Director of the Climate Change Studies Program, and Eva Rocke, UM Sustainability Director, will co-facilitate and have enlisted a diverse lineup of guests and subject matter experts to contribute content. The process of bringing together faculty from all disciplines to discuss sustainability across the curriculum was pioneered at Northern Arizona University and Emory University and the resulting Piedmont/Ponderosa Model was first adopted at UM in 2011. This upcoming workshop is the first time UM has hosted a Green Thread event since 2014.
Piedmont/Ponderosa Model
The Piedmont / Ponderosa model of faculty and curriculum development supports a number of outcomes including:
- Promoting faculty development and cross-disciplinary collaboration, which is the cornerstone of sustainability literacy
- Provides faculty with a set window of time to modify current, existing courses or to develop new courses alongside peers and a variety of sustainability-adjacent professionals
- Creates high impact by expanding the number of sustainability-related course offerings, exposing more students to sustainability concepts than would be exposed should these discussions only happen in environmental science courses
History of Green Thread efforts at UM
Green Thread workshops were originally offered at UM in 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2014 before funding for the program was eliminated. Lisa Swallow and Steve Schwarze facilitated the workshops after UM faculty attended a Sustainability Across the Curriculum training in Atlanta with the founders of the Piedmont Project. The model that UM’s workshop relies upon is based on the work done at Northern Arizona University and Emory University to infuse sustainability across as many academic areas as possible.
The equivalent of UM’s Green Thread workshop has been offered at dozens of colleges and universities over the last twenty years thanks to the early work of these sustainability-inspired faculty.
Past Green Thread Participants
(2011-2013, incomplete list)
Simona Stan, Marketing
Amy Ratto-Parks, English
James Laskin, Physical Therapy
Christina Yoshimura, Communications Studies
Mark Grimes, Biology
Jennifer Robohm, Psychology
Lee Banville, Journalism
Kyle Volk, History
Daisy Rooks, Sociology
John DeBoer, Theater
Megan Stark, Library Science
James Randall, Music