USC Green Week 2026, the university’s sixth annual weeklong celebration of campus sustainability, will take place next week, Sept. 28 to Oct. 2. The programming, hosted by the USC Office of Sustainability, will include hands-on education with the goal of “advancing USC’s Assignment: Earth goals,” according to a press release from the university.
Green Week launched in 2021 as part of former university president Carol Folt’s efforts to strengthen sustainability initiatives on campus. While the last year of Folt’s presidency was marked by investigations into her administration’s handling of 2024 commencement and protests surrounding the Israel-Palestine conflict, much of her term was defined by her “plan for a more sustainable USC,” according to USC Today.
Nearly two years after Folt announced her retirement, Beong-Soo Kim will be formally installed as USC president on Oct. 16. Ahead of Kim’s investiture, Trojans are wondering whether Kim will make the same investment to sustainability as his predecessor.
“With the new president, we are looking for sustainability commitment, and obviously [Kim’s] values as a president–he’s still figuring that out,” said Ellis Fertig, a junior studying civil engineering. “I think that it really should be an administrative priority of the president to provide more opportunities for students to get involved in sustainability and to make sure that campus operations and campus curriculum and the research are prioritizing sustainability.”
For students working on sustainability at USC, that clarity could shape how they advocate for environmental priorities on campus.
“I don’t have reason to think he’s anti-sustainability,” said Robert Drummond, a PhD candidate at USC and the director of sustainability for the graduate student government. “But it would be great to see him make those commitments public, so all the students can see.”
Since Folt’s departure, the Student Sustainability Committee dissolved and USC’s inaugural chief sustainability officer, Mick Dalrymple, left the university. Despite all the change, Dalrymple said USC is ‘looking forward’ when it comes to sustainability.
“My understanding is that USC is going to go through a strategic planning process, which is fantastic,” Dalrymple said. “You want to be formulating, ‘how are we going to get to this [sustainability goal] that we want to get?’ The president has a general direction, he’s looking for people to come together and develop this strategic plan.”
Dalrymple is temporarily succeeded by interim chief sustainability officer and director of the office of sustainability, Ellen Dux.
Dalrymple also served as co-chair of the Presidential Working Group on Sustainability in Education, Research and Operations. Dux says she will now co-chair with Dalrymple’s previous counterpart, Mahta Moghaddam, a professor of electrical engineering at USC.
Earlier this year, USC hired its inaugural executive vice president for finance and operations, Greg Goldman. Dux says despite the recent changes to sustainability, Goldman’s role could eventually lead to efficiency on initiatives in her line of work.
“There’s now one set of eyes saying, ‘the buck stops here. I can see across the entire playing field with the operations of the university,’” Dux said. “I think that’s going to be a giant win when all this settles. Mick retired at the same time, so suddenly there’s two different, pretty significant things changing simultaneously.”
Dux says her team plans to stay the course, and continue programming as anticipated in Darlymple’s absence.
“We are aiming for a continuation of programming that we’ve done in years past, [multiplied by] 50,” Dux said. “Just stay the course of what a typical year looks like for sustainability at USC. We’re just going to keep doing the things we’ve always done.”
While Kim has not yet made a formal statement on his commitment to sustainability, Dux feels confident he will maintain the same commitment to the matter as his predecessor.
“Sometimes all you can do is sort of look at actions and think, ‘okay, well if somebody’s putting energy into action somewhere, that’s a good sign,’” Dux said. “Kim came to Mick’s retirement party and walked into a room of sustainability. People were like, ‘what’s the plan? What are we going to do about sustainability?’ And he was like, ‘no change. No change. I’m not backing off anything.’”
USC did not respond to questions about Kim’s sustainability priorities in time for publication.
Kim will speak at the Los Angeles Business Council Sustainability Summit at Town and Gown on Oct. 1, as part of USC Green Week programming.
Additional USC Green Week programming from the Office of Sustainability includes plans to re-open the USC Peace Garden after the garden’s previous land plot was sold, Surplus Sales pop-ups at the Trojan Farmers Market on Sept. 30 and daily events throughout the week.