SUSI 2011 Hiking with Park Ranger in Boulder, Colorado

Environmental Leadership Institutes

The East-West Center is developing a vibrant network of young leaders dedicated and equipped to create innovative and positive solutions for 21st Century environmental challenges.  Participants from the Pacific, Southeast Asia, and Middle East gain leadership skills through the Institute’s experiential learning methods and contact with over fifty U.S. leaders in government, business, research and civil society.  Institutes begin in Honolulu, Hawaii and have included field studies to Maui and the Big Island of Hawaii; San Francisco and Monterey Bay, California; Boulder, Colorado; and Washington DC.  

Funding for the Study of the U.S. Institutes (SUSI) for Student Leaders on Global Environmental Issues has been provided by the Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

(To see participant profiles, home-country action plans, and team projects)
2012 SUSI Southeast Asia's Website
2012 SUSI Middle East's Website

SUSI Curriculum (PDF)
2012 SUSI Middle East Program (PDF)

Press Clips

• Young Filipino Environmentalists Attend Leadership Summit in U.S., by Gabrielle Paul Pascual, SUSI participant (Hawaii Filipino Chronicle, May 26, 2012)
• The Next Eco Warriors:  22 Young Women and Men Who are Saving the Planet (book chapter about SUSI alumnus, Subhashni Raj, 2011)
• Championing the Environment: Visiting Philippine Scholars Ready to Take Lead, by Renzo R. Guinto (Hawaii Filipino Chronicle, June 26 2010)
• "Environmental scholars from Asia study island sustainability" (Hawaii Tribune Herald, June 24 2010)
• "Raising a Green Family" (The Malaysian Star, May 30 2010)
• "New Environmental Stewardship Program Cultivates Action-Oriented Leaders" (East-West Center News, July 2009)
• "A Green Passion" (The Star Online, Malaysia, April 12, 2009)

Lead Staff

SUSI participants Sofiah Jamil, Wong Shu Kuan, and Masikerei Vunicagi at the UHM Lyon Arboretum Native Hawaiian Plant Research Center SUSI participants visit the HPower waste to energy plant

SUSI participants help offset the carbonfootprint of their international flights by planting trees at the UHM Environmental Center SUSI participants look at Hawai’i’s marine ecology