Kingsborough Student Environmental Club Partners with Trees NY to Bring $170K Tree Planting Initiative to Campus

Less than a year after its formation, KCC Environmental and Sustainability Club will bring 70 new trees to campus and Oriental Blvd., in campus cooling initiative, replacing some of the 256 trees lost to Superstorm Sandy in 2012

The Kingsborough Community College (KCC) student Environmental and Sustainability Club and New York City-based tree stewardship and advocacy organization, Trees New York, announced on Oct. 5 a $170,000, tree-planting initiative that aims to help cool the 70-acre South Brooklyn campus and replace 70 of the 256 trees the College lost to Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

“We are so proud of the leadership our students have demonstrated in bringing their vision of a more sustainable, environmentally friendly campus to life,” Kingsborough President Suri Duitch said. “We are grateful to Trees New York and their funding partner for helping to strengthen Kingsborough’s environmental resilience, promote well-being and create valuable educational opportunities for our students. This initiative will make our corner of Brooklyn a greener, cooler and more welcoming place for Kingsborough and our local communities.” 

While most of the work will take place over the next two planting seasons—spring and fall 2027—Trees New York planted five cherry trees on Oct. 5, in celebration of City of Forest Day, an annual day of activities across the city to raise awareness of the importance of the New York City urban forest, and the essential role New Yorkers play every day in caring for the “lungs” of our city. The ceremony also featured a land acknowledgement and a performance art piece choreographed exclusively for the ceremony by interdisciplinary artist Victor Chakravarty.

“Today is an opportunity for us to come together as students, faculty, community members and environmental advocates to make a lasting contribution to our campus, said Carlyne Enid Torres, president of the Kingsborough Environmental and Sustainability Club. “Through the planting of these five cherry trees, we are helping create a greener, more welcoming environment for our community and future generations. We hope to build on this momentum by bringing more sustainable initiatives to Kingsborough so that future generations of KCC students can thrive.”

The initiative will bring a pollinator garden and 65 kwanzan cherry, pin oak, bald cypress, dogwood and Kentucky coffee trees to the campus, including five street trees near the school’s Oriental Boulevard entrance to provide shade where people wait for the bus. The initiative will be supported by a grant awarded to Trees New York by a private trust that will also pay for the removal of three dead trees.

“Every year, New York City deals with brutal heatwaves, and the urban heat island effect puts our communities at even greater risk. Trees are one of our city’s best defenses against extreme heat, especially on private properties like schools, which have the greatest potential to expand our urban forest canopy,” said Nelson Villarrubia, executive director of Trees New York. “That’s why Trees New York is proud to partner with Kingsborough Community College to restore its tree canopy and make the campus cooler and more welcoming for students. Together, we are committed to planting over 70 trees and caring for them for the long term.”

The partnership began last spring when the newly formed Environmental and Sustainability Club identified several areas on campus that feature benches with waterfront views of Sheepshead and Jamaica bays and green spaces where students gather but where the sun can feel brutally strong on a sunny day. Many of these campus green spaces, such those along the parking lot sidewalk on the Jamaica Bay side of campus, were areas where campus trees were washed away during Hurricane Sandy, or died in the years following the superstorm that flooded the college’s buildings and grounds.

Trees New York’s Villarrubia and Education Director Sam Bishop visited campus last summer to meet with students and tour the campus with club members, faculty and staff to see what was possible.

“When student leaders expressed a vision to plant native species and establish a pollinator garden on campus, we reached out to Trees New York to bring technical expertise to their ambition,” said Kingsborough Art Professor Midori Yamamura, the Club’s faculty advisor. “In social practice art, the greatest challenge is nurturing organic, community-led motivation rather than imposing top-down mandates. This 70-tree restoration is a celebration of student agency—a lasting, ground-up legacy created by our students, for the future of Kingsborough.”

Since the campus is prone to flooding, Trees New York will choose tree species that adapt well to these conditions. They will also choose trees that help diversify the existing tree population (Kingsborough has approximately 30 different species of trees on its campus) to increase resistance to pests and disease and to reduce monocultures.

The planting plan will take a variety of factors into account, including sightlines for security cameras, green or gray infrastructure, existing use of public spaces and appropriate planting conditions which mainly consist of an optimal amount of sunlight for the growing tree. Trees New York will also prioritize native species for the plantings if possible, but will use non-native species where appropriate.

In 2021, Kingsborough planted 58 London plane, honey locust and cherry trees in an effort to replenish some of the shade trees lost to Sandy. With the 70 additional trees, Kingsborough will have replaced 128 trees in its canopy.