Austin Sumter, Campus Carrier Online Editor

On Oct. 24, Berry was one of 10 winners of the Tree Campus USA – Arbor Day Event contest.  The school won $500 and Arbor Day items for an Arbor Day event.

Tree Campus USA is a program started by the Arbor Day Foundation to help “colleges and universities around the country establish and sustain healthy community forests,” according to the Tree Campus USA website.  Eddie Elsberry, Berry’s director of environmental compliance and sustainability, said that Berry has worked “for the past three years” to become a part of the program. 

To be eligible to apply, a school must adhere to five standards.  A school must have a Campus Tree Advisory Committee, have a Campus Tree Care Plan, have a Campus Tree Program with dedicated annual expenditures, observe Arbor Day and have a service learning project.  Berry was able to apply for Tree Campus USA after the Sustainability Committee, Physical Plant and Chris Hughes of Brookwood Tree Consulting created a Tree Canopy Plan.

Voting for the contest opened on Oct. 15 and ended on Oct. 22.  Even at the beginning of the contest, “Berry College held a commanding lead…(which) shows that Berry’s family and friends take pride in the Berry College campus and its breathtaking beauty,” Elsberry said. 

Students from the physical plant “are responsible to water, prune and monitor health of trees on main campus,” Elsberry said. 

Nealie Smith, staff photojournalist (Above) Workers continue construction for Valhalla stadium.  The project began by clear-cutting the area.   (Below) Trees line a road on mountain campus.  The view is only a portion of all of the plant life on campus.

Student volunteers help with the tree conservation efforts led by Dana professor of biology Martin Cipollini. Cipollini is the head of three tree conservation and land use projects on Berry’s campus—the Berry College Longleaf Pine Project, the Georgia chapter of the American Chestnut Foundation and the Educational Land Use Committee (ELM).  In his research “the student focus is the main thing, Cipollini said. His students “do a lot of hands-on work” on a “small scale.”  Cipollini’s volunteers are responsible for management, data collection, scientific reporting of the research collected and more. 

Cipollini is also a part of the school’s arboretum project where a collection of trees will be on display for study.  This project will help increase the school’s canopy and aesthetic. 

Students will be involved to map, measure and identify trees on main campus.  This project has helped the administration decide which species of trees and how many trees to plant to replace the trees lost due to the ongoing construction near the service road for the practice sports field and stadium.   The school is already growing “trees on our campus tree farm for replanting in this area and around campus,” Elsberry said. 

Senior Jessica Krasich said she was happy Berry was one of the winners. 

“I’m glad that Berry College is getting recognition for our conservation efforts and beautiful campus,” Krasich said.

“Our campus is this valuable resource,” Cipollini said.  “We often just think of (the campus) as pretty.  There’s this additional value that sometimes isn’t as well recognized … we’re trying to emphasize the academic use of the land and the benefit to students.”