-Method Tools-

     We gathered a compilation of both primary and secondary research sources. The primary sources consist of an interview with Larry Fodor, director of Energy Conservation in the Office of Sustainability and a survey listing students' responses to thirteen questions. These questions would allow us to know how much support to a 'Green Fee' we have from our student body. Secondary research sources consist of academic news articles, blogs, and press newsletters found online related to our topic of interest for this feasibility study.

Interview with Larry Fodor

     We begin with the interview with Larry Fodor in order to gain background information as to the exact issue WSU Office of Sustainability is current facing. We are able to see how it is that we should generate potential solutions to solve this issue. This knowledgeable foundation allows us to figure out how best we can approach and present alternatives to fixing the system.

Alternative 1: 'Green' Student Fees (Student Grant)

     In researching for our first alternative, we begin with two websites (one a press news article and the other a academic news article). These secondary sources provide information from two universities that implemented a 'Green' student fee to help increase the Sustainability funding. This helped us generate a range for our survey on how much students are willing to help contribute as well as how the money is used. We incorporated a survey to see if WSU students would approve the extra fee.

We then again searched online to find out how these student fees are being implemented and how prevalent this program is with schools around the United States. We found one official university website which incorporates those student fees to help grow a grant fund. We also found that just in 2012 there were already over fifty schools with the student fees for sustainability in progress.

Alternative 2: The Self-Revolving Funds

     We could not search through the possible examples of self-revolving funds other universities implemented without knowing what it is in general. We found a institute report online called 'Greening The Bottom Line'. It gives a general detail on how things are managed and how funding works. One perfect example came from an official school documentation report on their version of the Green-Revolving Fund. This came from Champlain College. This university gave us a model that we could similarly adapt it to our campus and aid the university in generating more funding for future "green" projects.

Alternative 3: The Hybrid Model

     Here, we look at the two previous alternatives and their resources to discover ways to incorporate both systems together to create this next alternative: the Hybrid Model. It requires putting key concepts together while at the same time taking unnecessary ideas out. One feasible concept came from Harvard University. In their official website, there is a section in their sustainability website which lists their student grant and revolving fund. Harvard has both programs implemented but are not related and both funding work differently.

What needs to be worked on:

The method section layout is organized around the alternative. You should try to organized the section around Primary and Secondary Research and within those sections relate them back to your alternatives.  Back up your methods, how they were performed, why are they credible?  why do your participants matter?  (age, relevance to the university)

- Need to tell things your reader wants to know about the way you obtained the facts and ideas presented in the report

- Persuades the readers that this method would produce reliable results