JUST Label: Transforming Your Company with Transparency

AIA Houston COTE - JE:DI event: 

Join Kate Spector (ILFI South Central ambassador), Heather Holdridge (Lake|Flato), Heidi Creighton (Buro Happold), and Katherine Ruiz (Dillon Kyle Architects) for a discussion about the ILFI JUST Label and their personal experience with the adoption of the label within their respective firms.

The International Living Future Institute’s JUST™ program is a “nutrition label” disclosure tool for socially just and equitable organizations and requires reporting on a range of organization-and employee-related indicators through their voluntary disclosure platform. Each of the indicator metrics asks for simple yet specific and measurable accountabilities in order for the organization to be recognized at a particular level. The JUST label also provides guidance to organizations and assists them in optimizing their policies in social equity and employee engagement.

AIA Credit: 1.0 HSW/LU

Date: November 18

Time: Noon - 1:00pm (CST)

Virtual Webinar: Zoom Meeting

Cost: All AIA members experiencing hardship (loss of work, reduced pay) as a result of COVID 19, may attend these sessions FREE. Please email Rhonda for hardship request.

• AIA or AIA Assoc Member - $10
• Affiliate Member - $10
• Non-Member - $25
• Request Hardship Consideration / AIA Members - $0

Registration is required.  Instructions will be emailed to all registrants the day before the presentation.

Biographies: 

KATELYN SECTOR, LEED GREEN ASSOCIATE, LFA
As the Lake|Flato’s Design Performance Coordinator, Kate informs firm-wide design performance efforts and coordinates with project teams at all phases, including project specific performance goal setting, building simulations, certification processes and documentation, and post-occupancy evaluation. Kate is driven by an interest in ecoregional design that leads to effective passive design strategies and supplements with renewables to create regenerative and mutualistic design inspired by place. She additionally specializes in embodied carbon research, biomimicry, and daylight and energy analysis. Her current projects include creating the firm’s Design Performance Action Plan and Embodied Carbon research journal. Kate graduated from the University of Colorado, Boulder with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Design and a Certificate of Renewable and Sustainable Energy. She is a member of the AIA COTE San Antonio Chapter and is an ambassador for the ILFI-South Central Texas Collaborative. When she is not at work, Kate enjoys exploring the outdoors, cooking and ceramics.

HEATHER HOLDRIDGE, EIT, ASSOCIATE AIA, LEED FELLOW
Heather Gayle Holdridge, LEED Fellow, EIT, Associate AIA is the Sustainability Director at Lake|Flato Architects. Leveraging her background in mechanical engineering, Heather directs all Lake|Flato teams in establishing sustainability goals. She devises strategies and systems to realize those goals under programs such as LEED, the 2030 Challenge, and the Living Building Challenge. Heather works closely with teams to evaluate passive systems and performs energy modeling throughout the design process.  She received a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin and a Master of Business Administration from The University of Texas at San Antonio.

HEIDI CREIGHTON, AIA, LEED FELLOW, WELL FACULTY, FITWEL AMBASSADOR
Heidi Creighton, AIA, is an associate principal at Buro Happold and is a LEED Fellow, WELL Faculty, and Fitwel Ambassador. Her work focuses on sustainability and wellness strategies for academic, healthcare, commercial, and residential projects. Heidi has led multiple initiatives within Buro Happold dealing with internal sustainability, wellness and diversity. In support of a firm-wide diversity initiative, Heidi proposed that Buro Happold U.S. pursue the JUST Label. Buro Happold U.S. now has its JUST Label, accomplished through the policy, diversity and pay-scale data needed for reporting to this transparent database. This label underlines Buro Happold’s commitment to and engagement with our employees, today and in the future. She has also been instrumental in the launch of a Diversity & Inclusion Forum at Buro Happold, intended to promote understanding and appreciation of diversity within the office.

KATHERINE RUIZ, AIA, LEED AP BD&C, SITES AP
Katherine Ruiz, AIA, LEED AP BD&C, SITES AP is the chair of AIA Houston COTE and an Associate at Dillon Kyle Architects, where she provides office-wide support on sustainable design. A longtime specialist in sustainability, she has completed the LEED Certification of over two million square feet, including the DKA Design Studio, and her expertise includes indoor air quality and materials research, daylighting studies, and resource-efficient design. She has presented on a variety of sustainability topics to better educate the building industry on how design can be environmentally, socially, and economically sustainable, and has a specific interest in social justice by design.

Katherine is highly engaged with the Houston community – she has acted as a representative of the building industry through her position on the AIA Houston Disaster Resilience Taskforce, as the 2019 Chair of the Gulf Coast Green Conference, and is a founding member of the AIA Houston JEDI Collaborative. Katherine earned her Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Notre Dame.