Campus Engagement
Introduction
Engaging in sustainability issues through co-curricular activities allows students to deepen and apply their understandings of sustainability principles. Institution-sponsored co-curricular sustainability offerings, often coordinated by student affairs offices, help integrate sustainability into the campus culture and set a positive tone for the institution. Faculty and staff members’ daily decisions impact an institution’s sustainability performance. Equipping faculty and staff with the tools, knowledge, and motivation to adopt behavior changes that promote sustainability is an essential activity of a sustainable campus.
Featured Resources
New Resources
Integrating Equity and Basic Needs Programs into Higher Education Sustainability Initiatives
- University of California, Santa Cruz (CA)
Amidst a global pandemic the expectations and experiences for students within their higher education institutions are indicating increased challenges to well-being and student success. International to first generation and non-traditional ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Addressing the Misalignment of Retirement Options and Stated Values on a University Campus
- University of North Carolina, Asheville (NC)
There is a growing interest in personal retirement investments that consider both building wealth and making long-term positive impacts on our planet, society, and future. However, at many colleges and ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Lessons of Sustainability Learned as a Disaster Mental Health Counselor
- California State University, Stanislaus (CA)
Providing services as a disaster mental health counselor involves the following for survivors: understanding their expectable reactions, employing short-term interventions, restoring their personal safety, utilizing multicultural competency and awareness, and ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Sustainability Dashboards: From Hopes & Dreams to Reality & Maintenance
- University of Pittsburgh (PA)
- University of Oregon (OR)
University-wide Sustainability Dashboards can emphasize and juxtapose the various aspects of sustainability, while increasing institutional transparency. Organizing and presenting institutional performance data helps quantify universities' progress as sustainability leaders while ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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The Future of Building Science Education with the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon
- National Renewable Energy Laboratory (CO)
Experience the future of building science education with the U.S. Department Energy Solar Decathlon, from walkthroughs of winning build projects to the opportunity to ask an expert about building ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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"Who's the Contact Person for That?": Creating Sustainability Hubs for More Effective Connection
- Binghamton University (NY)
The strengths of academic institutions are often related to research, curricula, and pedagogy. While these are critical areas to highlight, there are often several additional innovative initiatives and activities occurring ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Climate Communication: Practical Applications for Educators, Students, and Service Learning Programs
- Eckerd College (FL)
- Student Public Interest Research Group (IL)
Join Dr. Joanna Huxster, Assistant Professor in Environmental Studies at Eckerd College, and Dan Xie, Political Director for the Student Public Interest Research Groups (PIRGs) for a session on the ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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What Are We Even Doing Here? Empowering Students in the Face of Overlapping Crises
- University of Oregon (OR)
Teaching and mentoring Gen-Z students can often feel full of cognitive dissonance as we talk about career possibilities or the value of upcycling a t-shirt into a tote bag even ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Leveraging Change Communication & Management Theories for Sustainable Employee Behavior Change
- University of Pittsburgh (PA)
The last year has been extremely stressful with the Covid-19 global pandemic, sustainability crises looming, and employee burnout across sectors. So how do we build a suite of programs that ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Stay Rad, Post Grad!
- Post-Landfill Action Network (NH)
Are you graduating? Are you panicking? Or maybe you know exactly what you want to do, but it's just a matter of making it happen. Join the PLAN staff ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Advising for Sustainability
- West Chester University of Pennsylvania (PA)
All campus spaces and interactions are pedagogical, and since NACADA, the main professional organization devoted to academic advising, maintains that advising is teaching, we can use advising as a powerful ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Building Resilient, Long Lasting Student Led Movements
- University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point (WI)
Often times university student movements come and go due to graduating leaders and loss of knowledge. These groups are full of fire and passion and at points drift into nothing ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Zero Waste as a Tool for Transformation: How Swarthmore College Engages Campus and Reduces Waste
- Swarthmore College (PA)
Swarthmore College’s Office of Sustainability hires 20 student employees annually to participate in its Green Advisor program. Green Advisors act as campus sustainability advocates and often express concern about ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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A Fresh Take on Recycling Contamination Education: Moving Beyond the Traditional Waste Audit
- University of Arizona (AZ)
The University of Arizona began a residential waste auditing program over ten years ago. What started as a typical waste audit project with sorting and weighing has grown into something ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Creating Meaningful Volunteer Opportunities for Students Online
- University of Guelph (ON)
- Humber College (ON)
COVID-19 has uprooted our day-to-day lives and has made it challenging to provide meaningful learning experiences for students who are now pursuing their education and extracurricular activities entirely online. In ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Fun with Food Systems: Creative Ways to Increase Food Sovereignty and Build Community Remotely
- Portland Community College (OR)
Food shortages skyrocketed at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, and community college students were notably affected. Normal campus supports such as in-person food pantries, learning gardens, and our campus ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Creating Alumni Connections Through a Sustainability Course
- Connecticut College (CT)
Once per year, the Office of Sustainability offers a 2-credit course called SUS 293: Applied Sustainability. The course is designed for interns in the Office and other students interested in ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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College Campuses as the "Great Equalizer" - Or Are They: A Critical Perspective to Sustainability
- Winthrop University (SC)
College campuses have often been touted as the great equalizer, a place where those who are marginalized, either racially or economically, have as much ability to succeed as their non-marginalized ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Growing Future Leaders: How to Foster Growth in Sustainability Leadership Programs
- Bentley University (MA)
- Boston University (MA)
- Tufts University (MA)
- GreenerU (MA)
In this session, you will hear from the sustainability offices with well-developed student leadership programs, and share your questions, suggestions, and learn lessons from being a student leader or managing ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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A Zero Waste Campus Is Possible
- Post-Landfill Action Network (NH)
In this workshop we will facilitate a discussion around how students can lead specific efforts to solve waste issues on their campuses. We start with a short presentation on the ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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STARS Assessment as a Curricular Opportunity
- Furman University (SC)
The Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System (STARS) is a transparent, self-reporting framework used to measure a university’s overall sustainability performance. In most cases the STARS assessment is conducted ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Virtually Vital-Going Green, Globally
- Dallas College (TX)
The members of the Cedar Valley Student Green Club used creativity to utilize a virtual platform to pioneer a variety of firsts for our campus at a time when many ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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TreeCATs (Collegiate Arborist Trainings): A Model for Campus Tree Engagement
- University of Kentucky (KY)
The TreeCATs (Collegiate Arborist Training) workshops, facilitated by the UK Urban Forest Initiative (UFI), promote knowledge, insights, skills, and engagement for college students, emboldening them to take a more active ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Project-based Education Approaches to Help Communities Meet Global Sustainability Challenges
- Worcester Polytechnic Institute (MA)
The needs and challenges in assuring a sustainable society are now greater than ever. The challenges range from water pollution and lack of potable drinking water, to solid waste management ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Grassroots to Green Energy: How Five Students Brought Five Acres of Solar to UW-Platteville.
- University of Wisconsin-Platteville (WI)
- McKinstry (WA)
While hundreds of United States colleges and universities have signed the Presidents' Climate Leadership Commitments, HOW to actually start and land renewable energy projects within the complex, frequently cash-strapped world ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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A Campus Sustainability Map Organized by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals
- University of Wisconsin-Madison (WI)
"Designing a map is not a trivial task." (1) This session discusses the purpose, process, and outcomes of developing a campus sustainability map. However, as we will demonstrate, while designing ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Change Management Campfire Stories: Telling Stories About Our Stumbles and What We Learned
- Georgetown University (DC)
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MA)
- Stanford University (CA)
- University of California, Office of the President (CA)
This session will provide a virtual campfire story swap where long-time campus sustainability professionals will talk about their stumbles, unexpected outcomes, how they felt, and what they learned. The saying ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Advocacy for Justice: Classrooms, Colleagues and Community
- Catawba College (NC)
This session will provide an opportunity for an in-depth and perceptive discussion surrounding the intersections of justice across the varied social landscapes within Higher Education. Connected to this is an ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Climate Action Simulation (With en-Roads): A Group Role-Playing Game
- University of Massachusetts Lowell (MA)
- University of Minnesota System Office (MN)
In a lightning fast and immersive method that the presenters have perfected in numerous online trainings, participants will learn how to facilitate a group role-playing simulation (which functions as a ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Conducting a Voluntary University Review to Engage a Campus With the Sustainable Development Goals
- University of California, Davis (CA)
In this presentation, UC Davis Sustainability staff will share how we leverage our sustainability performance assessment as an engagement tool, and we will specifically focus on the process we used ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Herbicide Free Campus: Re-Engaging Students With Their Environment
- Re:wild Your Campus (TX)
Herbicide-Free Campus (HFC) envisions a toxin-free world created by student action. Founded by students, HFC empowers youth leaders to re-engage their campuses with creative outdoor work to end campus reliance ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Immersion & Collaboration: Engaging Students, Staff, and Faculty in Sustainability Reporting
- Ball State University (IN)
For more than a decade, student teams from Ball State University have applied the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) principles and standards to document the operational management approach and annual sustainability ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Move Out Programs: Finding the Solution for Your Campus
- Post-Landfill Action Network (NH)
Every year when students move out of their dorms and apartments, tons of useful stuff is left behind or discarded. Over the past decade or so, campuses all across the ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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The Sustainability Mindset Indicator
- oikos International
- FOM University of Applied Sciences for Economics and Management
It has become clear that change is urgent in order to halt the many impacts humans have on our planet. Research has shown that if we want to promote engagement ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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A Beginner's Guide to Developing a Comprehensive Communication Strategy
- Lehigh University (PA)
As sustainability professionals, we tend to wear many hats. This session is designed for those who are new to communications and unsure of where to begin developing a communications plan ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Approaches to Teaching Sustainability-Key Competencies
- Colorado Mountain College (CO)
- University of Dayton (OH)
- University of Hawaii System Office (HI)
- Sustainability Curriculum Consortium (MD)
As courses and programs in sustainability continue to expand in higher education, instructors are called on to develop and adapt new and innovative approaches to teaching that enable students to ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Engaging with Community Partners to Advance Sustainability Learning -- A New Affinity Group
- Georgia Institute of Technology (GA)
Integrating Service-Learning/Community Engagement (SLCE) into Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) offers opportunities to enhance student learning outcomes and competencies across diverse disciplines. Research has demonstrated that service-learning can deepen ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Sustainable Living and Collaborative Learning on Pitt's Campus
- University of Pittsburgh (PA)
In the Fall of 2022, the University of Pittsburgh will launch it's first Sustainability Living Learning Community for both upperclassmen and freshmen. Living Learning Communities (LLCs) are specialized living ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Moving from 'Sustaina-splaining' to Inclusion
- California State University, San Marcos (CA)
- University of California, Santa Cruz (CA)
This presentation will highlight the work of several professionals (2 sustainability officers, 1 diversity, equity and inclusion practitioner and 1 campus center director) at two California universities. We will will ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Leadership & Sustainability in Action: A Practitioner's Case for Integrated Teaching
- Florida State University (FL)
- Harvard University (MA)
At colleges and universities all over the United States, instructors of leadership courses argue that they teach students about equitable, healthy leadership and prepare the next generation of leaders to ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Sustainability & Environmental Career Exploration Series
- Tulane University (LA)
This presentation will share a new approach to career exploration developed for the spring of 2021 by the Tulane Office of Sustainability. The series brought together a number of existing ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Reducing Campus Waste: Ten Years of a Campus FreeStore
- Bemidji State University (MN)
Mother earth is crying out for help, and we are the only ones that have the power to do make things better; for this reason the Sustainability office at Bemidji ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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The Future Is Interdisciplinary: A Campus Farm Model
- Grand Valley State University (MI)
This presentation will focus on the GVSU Sustainable Agriculture Project, an interdisciplinary, four-acre, student operated farm. The mission of the SAP is to seed sustainable agriculture best practices, cultivate leadership ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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20 Paths to a Living Wage Policy: Is Fair Employment in Your Institution's Future?
- Saint Joseph's University (PA)
Raising the federal minimum wage has been discussed by the Biden administration and a living wage is receiving increased attention by public, media, employers, and employees. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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How Earth Month Strengthens Student Engagement & Campus-Community Ties
- San Jose State University (CA)
In this session, our inter-departmental campus team will share SJSU's unique Earth Day history and tell the story of how we organized a unique Earth Month series of workshops ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Integrating Wellness and Diversity Into the Sustainability Model
- Augsburg University (MN)
- Bemidji State University (MN)
- St. Catherine University (MN)
The Bemidji State University (BSU) Sustainability Office realized in 2008 that the work they felt called to do required a different visual representation than the typical Venn diagram that includes ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Integrating Sustainability Literacy Competencies Into Teacher Preparation Programs
- University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point (WI)
Education for sustainability is critical in preparing future generations with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions necessary to address the sustainability problems that challenge the health and stability of our world ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Let Your Actions Speak: How to Connect Individual Change to Systems Change
- EcoChallenge.org (OR)
To create and enact the solutions necessary for a sustainable future, we need our students - regardless of major - to develop both a sense of and a skill set for agency ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Connecting Your Campus Across Intersections of Climate, Race, and Internationalization
- The GREEN Program (PA)
- Climate Action Network for International Educators (CANIE) (Victoria)
Environmental justice is racial justice. Sustainability necessitates addressing racism. Higher education must play its part to proactively strategize and foster interdepartmental collaboration to address environmental justice at our campus and ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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Utilizing Sustainability Literacy and Culture Assessments for Student Research and Advocacy
- Christopher Newport University (VA)
This session highlights the successes of a unique collaboration between undergraduate student researchers, faculty, and sustainability staff. The group developed their university's first sustainability literacy and culture assessment (SLCA ...
- Posted Jan. 21, 2022
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This tab provides access to data collected through AASHE’s Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System™ (STARS). STARS is a transparent, self-reporting framework for colleges and universities to measure their sustainability performance. STARS enables meaningful comparisons over time and across institutions using a common set of measurements developed with broad participation from the campus sustainability community.
All responses reference content from reports under the latest version of STARS, version 2.2. AASHE membership and log-in is required.
EN 1: Student Educators Program
- Percent of students served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program
- Description of the student educators program (1st program)
- Description of the student educators program (2nd program)
- Brief description of the student educators program (3rd program)
- Hours worked annually by trained student sustainability educators per students served
- Website URL - Student sustainability educators programs
EN 2: Student Orientation
- Percent of entering students that have an opportunity to participate in sustainability-inclusive orientation activities and programming
- Description of how sustainability is included prominently in new student orientation
- Website URL - Information about sustainability in student orientation
EN 3: Student Life
- Description of the active student groups focused on sustainability
- Description of student gardens, farms, CSAs, fishery programs, and/or urban agriculture projects
- Description of the student-run enterprises
- Description of student sustainable investment funds, green revolving funds or sustainable microfinance initiatives
- Description of sustainability-focused conferences, speaker series, symposia, or similar events for students
- Description of sustainability-focused cultural arts events, installations, or performances
- Description of the wilderness or outdoors programs that follow Leave No Trace principles
- Description of sustainability-focused themes chosen for themed semesters, years, or first-year experiences
- Description of the programs through which students can learn sustainable life skills
- Description of sustainability-focused student employment opportunities offered by the institution
- Description of graduation pledge(s)
- Description of other co-curricular sustainability programs and initiatives
EN 4: Student Life
- Website URL - Central sustainability website
- Description of sustainability newsletter or social media platform(s)
- Description of the signage that highlights campus sustainability features
- Description of the sustainability walking map or tour
- Description of the guide for green living and/or incorporating sustainability into the residential experience
- Description of other comprehensive sustainability outreach materials and publications
EN 5: Student Life
- Description of the first sustainability outreach campaign
- Description of the second sustainability outreach campaign
- Description of other sustainability-related outreach campaigns
EN 6: Assessing Sustainability Culture
- Description of how and when the cultural assessment(s) were developed and/or adopted
- Copy or sample of the questions related to sustainability culture (upload)
- Copy or sample of the questions related to sustainability culture (description)
- Website URL - Assessment of sustainability culture
EN 7: Employee Educators Program
- Percent of employees served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program
- Description of the employee educators program (1st program)
- Description of the employee educators program (2nd program)
- Hours worked annually by trained employee sustainability educators per employees served
- Website URL - Employee sustainability educators programs
EN 8: Employee Orientation
- Percent of new employees that have an opportunity to participate in sustainability-inclusive orientation activities and programming
- Description of how sustainability is included prominently in new employee orientation
- Website URL - Information about sustainability in employee orientation
EN 9: Staff Professional Development & Training
- Estimated percentage of regular, non-academic staff that participates annually in sustainability professional development and training
- Description of any internal sustainability professional development and training opportunities
- Description of any external professional development and training opportunities in sustainability that are supported by the institution
- Estimated percentage of staff for which sustainability is included in performance reviews
- Description of how sustainability is included in staff performance reviews
- Website URL - Information about staff professional development and training in sustainability
Additional analysis on scores and quantitative fields can be conducted using the STARS Benchmarking Tool.