Greencastle Commission on Sustainability Honors Anthony Baratta '10 & Madeline Piscetta '17

February 11, 2017

Anthony Baratta, director of sustainability at DePauw and 2010 graduate of the University, has been recognized as "Citizen of the Year" by the Greencastle Commission on Sustainability.  The group also named Madeline Piscetta, a senior at DePauw University, as the "Young Leader of the Year".  Three business were also presented with awards Thursday night prior to the Greencastle City Council meeting.

Baratta "helps oversee a number of successful initiatives at DePauw that reach out to the community, including the DePauw Campus Farm and Move Out -- a partnership with Putnam County Family Support Services to donate or sell discarded items -- and the Sustainability Leadership Program," reports the Banner-Graphic. "Over the past two years, the Sustainability Leadership Program has grown from a small cohort to 60 students, the largest program of its kind in the country and an innovative opportunity for students to implement sustainability initiatives in Greencastle and at DePauw.A 2010 DePauw graduate, Baratta and two dozen DePauw students spoke to more than 1,000 students across regional high schools and debuted a 20-student 'Sustainability Leadership Institute' summer high school workshop.Baratta is currently pursuing a master's degree in sustainability from Harvard Extension School."

The newspaper notes that "Piscetta has been instrumental in a number of sustainability projects at DePauw.She is in DePauw's interdisciplinary program, is an Environmental Fellow as well as the co-curricular Sustainability Leadership Program, where she serves as a 'student project manager.' Her current project focuses on "zero waste" initiatives. Piscetta and her team oversaw the implementation of the 'Green-to-Go' reusable food container initiative in DePauw dining halls. The goal is to eliminate more than 244,000 disposable containers per year.During her time at DePauw Piscetta has planned a "Water Music" concert, which brought together art and science to raise awareness for water quality and water scarcity issues. She has also worked on the campus farm and worked with DePauw Greek houses on recycling initiatives."

The piece adds, "Piscetta interned last summer at the World Wildlife Fund at its U.S. headquarters in Washington, D.C., where she helped plan the annual Fuller Science for Nature Symposium, which was conducted in November."

Read more at the Greencastle paper's website.

In May 2015, NPR featured the DePauw Office of Sustainability's "Move Out" program.  The segment is embedded below.

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