Green Campus Movement

Did you know that many US college presidents are working in a concerted effort to green our nations campuses?

Signatories of the American College and University President's Climate Commitment agree to institute proactive measures to cut campus emissions and waste. The document specifies several areas of action including a commitment to design new buildings to meet or exceed the US Green Building Council's LEED silver designation.

FYI: LEED has four levels of certification - certified, silver, gold, and platinum. The lowest level, Certified, indicates that some measures have been taken to minimize the building's carbon footprint. A Platinum designation is meted out for an A++ in sustainability; not many currently exist. Silver and Gold are somewhere in between.

President Martha Dunagin Saunders of the University of Southern Mississippi (where I am teaching a sustainability seminar this spring) signed the document when she was chancelor of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater and then again as president of USM.

To view the commitment - it's only two pages, go for it - click here:

http://www.presidentsclimatecommitment.org/html/commitment.pdf

And check to see if the leader of your institution of higher learning is a signatory.

http://www.presidentsclimatecommitment.org/html/signatories.php

Higher Learning meets Higher Purpose

I sat down with Larry Lee a few days ago to talk about sustainability on college campuses. Lee is the head of the University of Southern Mississippi's new office of sustainability and he is making great headway in raising awareness of green issues with the student and faculty population.

One his first actions was to implement a comprehensive campus-wide recycling program. He started a student bike-share program and he's bringing in environmental speakers on a regular basis. And, the university has made a commitment to only build sustainable buildings from here on out.

You've heard the cliche "thinking outside the box"? Lee acknowledges that our planning decisions must be proactive, taking into consideration our trajectory into the future, not just current circumstances. Lee used a term that I really like; he speaks of "thinking outside the decade."

More sustainability plans are in the works, but already Larry Lee - with the full support of president Martha Saunders - is making a difference.

Stay tuned for more updates.