The SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry has been awarded the highest rating from an international organization that rates sustainability. The recognition by The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education assessed aspects of the college’s education, practices, and welfare of employees.
On the one hand, environment is right in E-S-F’s name and Director of Sustainability Sue Fassler said activities such as transforming sections of campus seemed like the right thing to do. She explained students and volunteers planted a pollinator garden with native plants instead of more grass lawn, “transforming a lot of our campus grounds from a traditionally manicured, rather sterile vision of themselves into something that looks a little bit more wild, that serves pollinator and conservation value, … reducing pesticide and herbicide use.”
The changes had a natural and educational purpose, “as we were putting the last plants in the ground, a landscape architecture class came around and impromptu started using it as a teaching experience.”
The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education considered such things in its ratings, and many more.
“You are assessed on the number of departments you have teaching sustainability focused coursework. We have 100% of our departments doing that, so we max out points there. You also are assessed on the number of graduates that you're graduating in a certain year that have sustainability focused degree learning requirements. Also, departments conducting sustainability research. Shocker, 100% of our departments do that,” said Fassler.
There were other, more seemingly mundane things that counted: cleaning products and toilet paper purchases; ESF buys 98% sustainable products. Equipment purchasing is weighed; the college rated around 85% green.
But broader sustainability measures were also taken into account. For example, 98% of ESF workers make a living wage, while three-quarters of students are civically engaged.
So, you can see that this system looks at so many aspects of sustainability, including our investments, what our college foundation, how they choose to invest their money, and also our long-range planning. So, we have a sustainability action plan, for instance. And it also takes social equity and justice and folds it into the sustainability realm,” said Fassler.
ESF earned the Advancement of Sustainability Association’s top, Platinum rating. It provides a comparison to 1200 institutions in 52 countries. That can help with recruiting students and research dollars, but also lets the college look in the mirror.
“Our office exists to help the college practice what we teach because we would be doing a disservice to our students, and doing a little bit of greenwashing, if we were purporting to educate the next generation of environmental leaders and advocates, yet we weren't walking the walk on our campus,” added Fassler.
Fassler did note they could do better in areas such as quantifying their carbon footprint, we manage about 25,000 acres of forested properties, mostly in the Adirondacks. But we don't right now claim any formalized (carbon} offsets because we haven't gone through a process to quantify it.”
The college also has room to expand use of renewable energy, “we're a really urban campus where most of our students are, and there's not a lot of space for renewable energy. We could purchase some of that, but again, I think those are longer-term discussions we need to have,” acknowledged Fassler.
The rigor and scope of the award can provide valuable information to prospective students and the community. “We are just in a world where sometimes it's hard to know what the truth is and where to find that truth and who to ask for that truth and for that data,” Fassler said.
