CMU Students Seek Sustainability

A mobile alert woke Valentina Ortiz de Zárate long before sunrise. The Carnegie Mellon University senior put on boots and slung a camera over her shoulder for a trek along the Nine Mile Run watershed in Pittsburgh's Frick Park. The alert, an Alcosan Sewer Overflow Advisory, indicated that excess stormwater and untreated sewage overwhelming the system would be discharged into local waterways, and Ortiz de Zárate would be there to photograph it.

Ortiz de Zárate (pictured at left), who studies civil and environmental engineering with a student-defined additional major in environmental and sustainability studies, is among the growing cadre of CMU students who are approaching their education and future careers with a focus on sustainability. And while challenges like climate change can seem daunting, this new generation aspires to alter the current trajectory through both organized and individual action.

In her youth, Ortiz de Zárate organized bake sales and fundraisers to donate money for endangered animals to the World Wildlife Fund, due to a love of panda bears. In high school, she excelled in math, took four years of photography classes and competitively swam. She chose environmental engineering at CMU as a way to use her math skills to help solve problems she was passionate about.