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MSU earns national sustainability award
By Tom Oswald
MSU has received a national leadership award in recognition of its efforts to promote sustainability on campus.
At its annual meeting, the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) gave MSU the Campus Sustainability Leadership Award for schools with enrollments of more than 7,500.
SPEAKER SERIES:
United Nations Decade
of Education for Sustainable Development |
Sept. 19, 7:30 p.m. – Investing for a Sustainable Future: A Conversation. MSU alumna Julie Gorte, senior vice president for social investing at Pax World Management Corp., and Amy Muska O’Brien, director of social investing at TIAA-CREF, 107 South Kedzie.
Sept. 27, 7:30 p.m. – Mountaintop Removal: The Unseen Costs of Coal-Fired Power. Dave Cooper, mechanical engineer turned environmentalist, tells the story of mountaintop coal removal in Appalachia, 147 Communication Arts.
Oct. 2, 7:30 p.m. – Strides Toward a Sustainable Future. Satish Kumar, co-founder and director of programs for Schumacher College and editor of Resurgence, a magazine addressing sustainability for more than 40 years, Erickson Kiva.
Oct. 17, 7:30 p.m. – The Growing Alliance of Religion and Ecology. Mary Evelyn Tucker, co-director of the Forum on Religion and Ecology and senior lecturer and scholar at Yale University, 107 South Kedzie.
All events are free and open to the public.
Sponsored by: C.S. Mott Group for Sustainable Food Systems; MSU Auxiliary Services; Residential Initiative for the Study of Environment Sustailable Michigan Endowed Project; Department of Educational Administration; Program in Higher Adult and Lifelong Education and the Dr. Mildred B. Erickson Chair in Higher Adult and Lifelong Education; the Center for Systems Integration and Sustainability; and Community, Agriculture and Resource Studies.
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Terry Link, director of the Office of Campus Sustainability, said a growing commitment to sustainability helped MSU earn the award.
“We have adopted environmental stewardship as a major component of our campus vision,” Link said. “For example, we have committed to 2 percent annual reductions in greenhouse gas emissions through our participation in the Chicago Climate Exchange.”
The Chicago Climate Exchange is the world’s first, and North America’s only greenhouse gas emission registry, reduction and trading system for all six greenhouse gasses: carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons and sulphur hexafluoride.
Other examples of MSU’s commitment to sustainability include:
• MSU’s committment to meet Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design standards for new buildings, nationally accepted benchmarks for design, construction and operation of so-called “green” buildings.
• MSU’s lowest electrical consumption per square foot among Big Ten universities.
• MSU’s wide variety of academic programs and research initiatives related to sustainability. Five times more courses on sustainability were offered this year than in 2000, and a new specialization is being drafted.
Link added that MSU earned the award because it looks at more than just environmental issues when it comes to sustainability.
“Sustainability is about relationships and responsibilities – humans to the natural world and to each other across the human family with a due consideration for the generations that follow,” Link said.
MSU was selected from more than 20 applicants for the award.
“We had a very competitive pool of applicants this year, so winning one of these awards is a major achievement,” said Tom Kimmerer, executive director of the AASHE.
“Sustainability” is generally described as the ability to provide for the needs of the world’s current population without damaging the ability of future generations to provide for themselves.
For more information:
www.ecofoot.msu.edu
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