NSU Honored for Its Bee-Sustaining Efforts

NSU was recently named a Bee Campus USA affiliate.

“This award is a direct result of the combined efforts of the entire team working to increase our sustainability efforts across the campus, with special thanks to our Student Sustainability Coordinator, Tatum Hedrick, who worked diligently to ensure NSU received this award,” said Seth Mangasarian, Physical Plant Director for NSU’s Office of Facilities Management.

Bee City USA and Bee Campus USA are initiatives of the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, a nonprofit organization based in Portland, Oregon, with offices across the country. Bee City USA’s mission is to galvanize communities and campuses to sustain pollinators by providing them with healthy habitat, rich in a variety of native plants, and free of pesticides. Pollinators such as bumble bees, sweat bees, mason bees, honey bees, butterflies, moths, beetles, flies, hummingbirds, and many others are responsible for the reproduction of almost 90 percent of the world’s flowering plant species and one in every three bites of food we consume.

“The program aspires to make people more PC—pollinator conscious, that is,” said Scott Hoffman Black, Xerces’ executive director. “If lots of individuals and communities begin planting native, pesticide-free flowering trees, shrubs and perennials, it will help to sustain many, many species of pollinators.”

According to Bee Campus USA coordinator Laura Rost, “How each city or campus completes the steps to conserve pollinators is up to them. Affiliates play to their own strengths, designing pesticide reduction plans, improving habitat, and holding events ranging from garden tours to native plant giveaways to bee trivia nights.”

For more information about Bee Campus USA, visit https://www.beecityusa.org/

Posted 10/23/22