ACUPCC

By Thomas Pelis, Assistant Vice President for Facilities and Planning, SUNY Upstate Medical University

(This article appears in the May, 2012 issue of The ACUPCC Implementer)

By Kelly Boulton, Sustainability Coordinator, Allegheny College

(This article appears in the May, 2012 issue of The ACUPCC Implementer)

Sustainability at Allegheny College is a community endeavor. In collaboration with the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment, we’ve pledged to achieve climate neutrality by 2020. To meet this goal we’ve integrated sustainability principles into budgets, daily operations, job descriptions, purchasing and contract policies, and our Strategic Plan. Students explore and advance sustainability in interdisciplinary courses, innovative research such as aquaponics and wind feasibility studies, collaborations with the City of Meadville and local schools, and extracurricular activities such as the annual October Energy Challenge and theTrashion Show.  Creating a video to highlight our institution’s unique culture of sustainability as a finalist for Second Nature’s Climate Leadership Award was a rich and informative experience.  Conversations with our president, senior staff, faculty and students revealed a consistent yet multifaceted appreciation of our current sustainability initiatives as well as a deep-rooted commitment to the practical approaches needed to support future efforts and to meet our climate neutrality goal.

After more than 14,000 votes were cast during the Planet Forward video competition this month (on videos created by the 2012 Second Nature Climate Leadership Award Finalists), Planet Forward announced the top vote-getter this week: William Paterson University of New Jersey!

Watch the video at planetforward.org

William Paterson University was honored at the George Washington University Moving the Planet Forward Innovation Summit on Tuesday, April 17th, and will be featured in continued publicity with Planet Forward.

All 20 finalists are under consideration for a 2012 Climate Leadership Award. The winners will be chosen by the Second Nature Board, and honored at the Climate Leadership Summit at American University, June 21-22nd. Look for the announcement of this year’s Award Winners soon!

The top vote-getters for videos in each Carnegie Classification produced incredible videos  documenting their climate innovation:

By Sarah Brylinsky, Program Associate, Second Nature

(Download the symposium agenda, or a PDF version of this summary here.)

The Southwest Regional Collaborative Symposium – the second regionally focused conference hosted by Second Nature and the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment – took place at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona March 1^st- 2^nd, 2012.  ACUPCC Regional Symposiums focus on fostering collaboration among ACUPCC signatoriesfacing similar challenges and opportunities in their geographic regions.  With attendance by 38 universities and organizations throughout the Southwest, participants sparked cross-institutional dialogue and solutions to Climate Action planning, curriculum reform, and other key issues.

Keynote Speaker

Diana Liverman, Co-Director,
University of Arizona Institute of the Environment

By Carra Beth Cheslin, MobilizeU Campaign Coordinator, Earth Day Network

(This article appears in the April, 2012 issue of The ACUPCC Implementer)

By Ulrike Klein, Director of Operations and Communications, Second Nature and John Salak, President, The Salak Group

(This article appears in the April, 2012 issue of The ACUPCC Implementer)

By Peter Bardaglio, Senior Fellow, Second Nature

Welcome to the February – March 2012 issue of the TCCPI Newsletter, an electronic update from the Tompkins County Climate Protection Initiative (TCCPI).

Community Coalition Launches Energy Savings Campaign

A coalition of over 70 local organizations officially kicked off the “Get Your GreenBack Tompkins” campaign at a public launch party on February 29 at the Kitchen Theatrein Ithaca, NY. The campaign aims to inspire all 42,000 households and every business in Tompkins County to take at least one new energy and money-saving step in their transportation, energy, waste, and food choices in the next year, saving money, creating jobs, and bringing the county closer to its goal of reducing carbon emissions 80% by 2050.

Get Your GreenBack Launch Party- Photo Credit: Vanessa Dunn

By Juliana Goodlaw-Morris, Campus Field Manager for Campus Ecology, National Wildlife Federation and Julian Keniry, Senior Director of Campus and Community Leadership, National Wildlife Federation

(This article appears in the March, 2012 issue of The ACUPCC Implementer)

Students are the epicenter of any college or university campus.  They are the heart and soul and the reason why colleges and universities exist, and it would be a disservice to any campus if students were not engaged throughout all aspects of campus sustainability.  A myriad of lessons have been learned from engaging an estimated 460,000 student leaders hailing from 2,000 campuses over Campus Ecology’s 23 years and counting of programming at the National Wildlife Federation (NWF).  During this time, the program has also awarded approximately 180 Campus Ecology Fellowships to current undergraduate and graduate students and nearly 500 internships to recent graduates.   Throughout the evolution of campus sustainability, there have been changes in approach and goals for greening one’s campus; however the one constant has always been student leadership.

By Jenny Jocks Stelzer, Sustainability Council Chair and English Faculty, College of Liberal Arts, Robert Morris University

(This article appears in the March, 2012 issue of The ACUPCC Implementer)

In the 2011-2012 academic year, faculty of the College of Liberal Arts (CLA) on Robert Morris University’s Assessment Committee determined that the university should assess our students for awareness of and engagement with sustainability in the same way that the university assesses all students for proficiencies in oral and written communication, quantitative analysis, leadership, and collaboration. Until that point, the university had assessed for cultural awareness, which incorporated diversity as a value prioritized by the university. The CLA decided that sustainability, as defined by environmental, economic, and social justice for this and future generations, should join diversity as an important part of Robert Morris University’s role in preparing students to not only be career holders in an economy, but to be participants in a democracy as sustainable citizens.

In making these changes, Robert Morris University displays its commitment to the responsibility of higher education to not only prepare students for the workforce, but prepare them as local and global citizens. Because of its commitment to the ACUPCC, RMU has enthusiastically driven curricular change that prepares students to understand the interconnectedness between the individual, society, and the world, and, thus, to become a class of citizens capable of driving sustainability transformation in the future.