I wear sweater vests, I never split infinitives, I trim my beard close, and I read a poem at the beginning of every class. More to the point, as a member of the English faculty at a distinguished university, I distrust any word that had not been coined by the time my father—himself formerly a professor at a Jesuit university—completed his undergraduate studies.

So what am I doing as the faculty director of a Residential Learning Community (RLC) organized around the theme of “sustainability”?

In the past 18 months, the university that employs me hired its first sustainability coordinator, held its first Campus Sustainability Day, inaugurated a sustainability- across-the-curriculum program, has looked at ways in which sustainability might serve as a key theme for upper-division courses in the new Core Curriculum, and approved a Sustainable Living Research Project at the undergraduate level. Even this fine magazine has decided to dedicate this issue to the theme of sustainability.