The Pando project accelerator is located on the campus of the Sisters of Social Service and offers meeting and event support along with project acceleration space from its 11-acre Encino compound. Long associated with radical commitment, the campus is in process of being reimagined in light of Pope Francis’s “integral ecology.” UCLA’s Biophilia Treehouse rises at the center.
The Sisters of Social Service (SSS) is a community of women religious legendary for its work among disadvantaged and marginalized populations in the City of Los Angeles and throughout the world. Known for its radical commitment, the community includes among its members Blessed Sára Salkaházi, who was executed in Hungary in 1944 for protecting the lives of hundreds of Jewish children, and Sr. Simone Campell, a lawyer, outspoken advocate for social justice, and founder of Nuns on the Bus. Sr. Simone received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2022 from President Biden. Pando maintains an office and project accelerator space at the Sisters’ 11-acre campus in LA’s Encino neighborhood.
The campus aims to incarnate principles of a sustainable way of living, encouraged by the vision of Pope Francis for an “integral ecology.” In 2019, the Sisters installed the largest privately-owned residential solar panel installation in the State of California.
The 11-acre Encino includes a retreat center, serving highly diverse and pluralistic communities.
Visit us on campus! Here you will see:
Pando’s community partnership office. The office is a hub for fostering community engagement in Countywide sustainability work that develops out of the intersection of educational institutions, public agencies, and businesses/NGOs.
Biophilia Treehouse. Developed through the Pando Days 2019-20 season, the Biophilia Treehouse is a public-arts sculpture and biodiversity initiative installed on a hilltop overlooking the Encino campus’s lake. Designer Rebeca Mendez is creative director of the groundbreaking initiative, with an international team.
The project is a collaboration with Elon University’s Bringing Theory to Practice/PLACE with funding from the Mellon Foundation, UCLA, and others.
LACI offsite lab. The campus provides occasional offsite project work space to the LA Cleantech Incubator (LACI) to serve as a testsite for medium-scale development of breakthrough sustainable technology.
The first project to utilize the space was a startup called ePave, with paving solutions that address the “heat island effect” of asphalt and concrete surfaces.
Possible future programs for the campus include Pando retreats for intergenerational learning and intellectual reflection, and a relaunch of our residential fellowship program.
Stay tuned for further developments!
Related Programs
Pando at Maryknoll
2018-21
Prototype to incarnate the vision of Pope Francis’s “integral ecology” at the Maryknoll Monrovia campus.
