Coordination & Planning

2859 resources

An approach to the implementation of sustainability practices in Spanish universities

Sustainability issues in higher educational institutions have attracted increasing levels of attention from both the public and policy makers in recent decades. A number of previous studies have called for ...

  • Posted June 10, 2016
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Sustainable universities – a study of critical success factors for participatory approaches

Participatory approaches can be seen as a requirement, but also as a benefit to the overall paradigm change towards sustainable development and contribute towards the integration of sustainability concept into ...

  • Posted June 10, 2016
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Implementation of sustainability in universities as perceived by faculty and staff – a model from a Swedish university

Education for sustainable development creates new challenges for universities where faculty and staff are expected to prepare students to meet complexities in society and take responsibility for sustainability, which scientists ...

  • Posted June 10, 2016
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Comparing Sustainable Universities between the United States and China: Cases of Indiana University and Tsinghua University

  • Indiana University Bloomington (IN)
  • Temple University (PA)

It is widely accepted that universities can play critical roles in promoting sustainability. In the United States and China, many universities have initiated sustainability programs. Employing Indiana University, Bloomington, the ...

  • Posted June 10, 2016
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Sustainability Reporting in Higher Education: Interconnecting the Reporting Process and Organisational Change Management for Sustainability

  • Universidad Autonoma de Madrid (Madrid)
  • Utrecht University
  • KU Leuven

Although there has been a considerable increase in the publication of sustainability reports in the corporate world in the last decade, sustainability reporting in higher education institutions is still in ...

  • Posted June 10, 2016
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Institutional Framework for Student-Led Sustainability Initiatives

  • University of Nebraska - Lincoln (NE)

The Environmental Sustainability Committee (ESC) is a self-sustaining committee within the Association for Students of the University of Nebraska (ASUN), otherwise known as UNL’s Student Government. The framework of ...

  • Posted June 10, 2016
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Restructuring our Sustainability Advisory Committee to Increase Stakeholder Engagement and Advance Sustainability

  • Missouri State University (MO)

In support of the University’s Sustainability Vision Statement, the Sustainability Advisory Committee created four new subcommittees, corresponding to the major STARS categories: Academics, Engagement, Operations and Planning and Administration ...

  • Posted June 10, 2016
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UBC Okanagan Whole Systems Infrastructure Plan - Aspiring toward Regenerative Sustainability

  • University of British Columbia (BC)

This case study describes how UBC Okanagan created and leveraged an opportunity to develop an innovative, holistic campus sustainability plan that responds to UBC’s regenerative aspirations; what the Plan ...

  • Posted June 10, 2016
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The Virginia Tech Green RFP Program

  • Virginia Tech (VA)

Student engagement is an important factor in advancing sustainability at Virginia Tech. The University created the “Request for Proposal for Sustainability Initiatives from Student Organizations Program (Green RFP Program)” to ...


Implementing Sustainability in the Classroom at Université Laval

  • Université Laval (QC)

Université Laval has embraced a global approach to sustainability education. Although sustainability has been addressed in the classroom by individuals in the past, it is now being articulated with a ...


Lowell Canal Bridges TIGER Grant: Campus-Community Partnerships Leveraging Transformative Change

  • University of Massachusetts Lowell (MA)

The University of Massachusetts Lowell (UMass Lowell) is a fast growing university nestled within our host community of the City of Lowell, Massachusetts. Lowell enjoys an authentic urban character structured ...


Green Restaurant Certification for Dining Halls and Restaurants

  • Green Restaurant Association (MA)

Search over 500 restaurants to view the thousands of green steps they have implemented. Review the Green Restaurant® Education Section. Use the standards as a guidelines to help you make ...


Bringing KTH’s Environmental Performance to an Internationally Leading Level

  • KTH Royal Institute of Technology

This report analyses the types of international ratings/rankings available for universities to measure their sustainability performance. Sustainability has become an increasing topic of interest for universities to attract students ...


Framing a Turkish Campus Sustainability Assessment System

  • Pennsylvania State University (PA)

Sustainable campus design and planning in Higher Education requires an entire action plan and coordination of physical, educational, and social systems. Many institutions in the world are defining their sustainable ...


Campus sustainability efforts: A study of the long-term impact of college and university sustainability programs

  • University of Colorado Colorado Springs (CO)

The topic of this study is a new approach to understanding the effectiveness of campus sustainability efforts at American colleges and universities. A series of national sustainability organizations rate effectiveness ...


University of Minnesota, Morris student leads implementation of the Student Engagement Leadership Forum on Sustainability (SELFsustain) across the University of Minnesota-system

  • University of Minnesota, Crookston (MN)
  • University of Minnesota, Duluth (MN)
  • University of Minnesota, Morris (MN)
  • University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (MN)
  • University of Minnesota, Rochester (MN)

The University of Minnesota (U of M) is leading the way in cultivating student-driven sustainability leadership across Minnesota -- from the prairies to Lake Superior. For five years, U of M ...


Sustainability in Higher Education: Analysis and Selection of Assessment Systems

  • Technische Universiteit Delft

There is a noticeable increase in interest with regards to sustainability in higher education. As institutions investigate, implement and market sustainability efforts, there is a myriad of sustainability assessment methodologies ...


Raise Your Voice: Environmental Justice at Capilano

  • Capilano University (BC)

The idea for this event was to have an open idea sharing and focusing event regarding sustainability and environmental justice on campus. It was a chance to bring students together ...


A Model for Creating a Campus Sustainability Plan

  • California State University, Northridge (CA)

There are ample excellent reasons why all workplaces should create a sustainability plan, including most importantly the health of the planet. Climate change threatens the biosphere, ocean, atmosphere, our water ...


Carbon Neutral ExpoSaludable Fair Event in Bolivia

  • Berea College (KY)

We calculated the carbon emissions released during the ExpoSaludable fair in Bolivia to offset our footprint by planting trees in Santa Cruz, the city where the event takes place. The ...


Sustainability Peer Educator Program - Simon Fraser University

  • Simon Fraser University (BC)

Program Vision: Students are confident, informed, and active sustainability leaders who have the skills and experience to advance sustainability at and beyond SFU.

The Sustainability Peer Education program empowers students ...


Earning Capacity of Sustainable Education - A Review of Current Perceptions Regarding the Salaries, Under-employment and Over-education of Higher-Education Graduates and their Potential Application in Sustainability Assessments

  • University of Central Arkansas (AR)
  • Technische Universiteit Delft

There is a growing need to understand the economic returns of degrees as a function of a sustainable institution. The empirical data presented in this paper suggests that there is ...


The Urgent Need for Universities to Comprehensively Address Global Climate Change Across Disciplines and Programs

  • Minot State University (ND)

I review the status of scientific, political, and moral problems of global climate change (GCC) and, based on lessons from environmental and sustainability programs in universities, demonstrate that universities have ...


PhD Thesis: Sustainability reporting as a tool for management control and organisational change in higher education

The pursuit for a sustainable society has received increased attention over the last decades, due to global problems the world has been confronted with, such as population growth, climate change ...


UC Irvine Styrofoam Recycling Pilot Program

  • University of California, Irvine (CA)

As UC Irvine strives to become a Zero Waste campus by 2020, the Facilities Management Sustainability Team of student workers has become more innovative in the ways to divert materials ...


Starting with small energy conservation projects leads to huge energy conservation success

  • University of Rochester (NY)

The University of Rochester has many competing demands for funding. In the early 2000’s energy projects were managed by individual facilities departments with typically less than $40,000 expended ...


Engaging Stakeholders in Education for Sustainable Development at University Level

This book discusses the role of ESD stakeholders at university level, involving civil society and the private sector and public sectors (including local, national and intergovernmental bodies). In particular, it ...


The Transition to Resilience: A Comparative Case Study of Two Communities

  • Berea College (KY)
  • Oberlin College (OH)
  • University of Kentucky (KY)

This dissertation examines the question of how communities understand their risk related to global economic and environmental problems and how communities respond to those risks. Specifically, using comparative case study ...


Gaucho Certified Farmers Market

  • University of California, Santa Barbara (CA)

In the Fall of 2014, myself and a group of 5 other faculty members founded the first ever successful farmers market on the UC Santa Barbara campus.

The project was ...


Sustainability reporting in higher education: a comprehensive review of the recent literature and paths for further research

Over the last decade, sustainability reporting (SR) has gained importance in both profit and non-profit environments. In spite of the slowly emerging trend of SR in higher education, it is ...


UMass New2U Reuse Collection and Tag Sale

  • University of Massachusetts Amherst (MA)

New2U is a student-led program that is in its 3rd year of operation. New2U collects unwanted items from across campus each spring during move-out and resells these collected item each ...


NC State University Facilities, Academic Affairs Collaborate For Summer Energy Savings

  • North Carolina State University (NC)

A hot, humid North Carolina summer isn’t when you might expect NC State University to save nearly $900 a day in avoided energy costs. But thanks to a new ...


The Role of Pro-Environmental Behavior Change in Sustainability Planning and Programming in Higher Education

  • Ohio University (OH)

Behavior change is a prominent topic among sustainability practitioners in higher education, but what role does pro-environmental behavior change play in sustainability planning and programming at institutions of higher education ...


Future sustainability scenarios for universities: moving beyond the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development

As achievements of the completed United Nations Decade (2005-2014) of Education for Sustainable Development are contemplated globally, along with potential steps forward for the future, Member States have urged that ...


Organizational Change and Organizational Learning for Promoting Higher Education for Sustainable Development

  • Dalhousie University (NS)

The scholarship of higher education for sustainable development has been criticised for its reliance on case studies and lack of theoretical rigour. This chapter provides a brief overview of several ...


Organizational transformation and higher sustainability management education: The case of the MBA Sustainability Management

  • Griffith University (Queensland)
  • Leuphana University of Lüneburg

Purpose

This paper aims to investigate the roles of leadership in enabling sustainability transformation of universities and higher sustainability management education. It advocates research into the role of leadership for ...


Decision-Analytic Approach for Water Sustainability Definition: A Higher Education Case Study

  • George Washington University (DC)

The purpose of this paper is to describe the development of a multi-criteria decision analysis approach that can be used to circumscribe the definition of sustainability within an organization or ...


An integrated approach to achieving campus sustainability: assessment of the current campus environmental management practices

  • King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals

Universities can nowadays be regarded as ‘small cities’ due to their large size, population, and the various complex activities taking place in campuses, which have some serious direct and indirect ...


The failure of non‐binding declarations to achieve university sustainability: A need for accountability

  • RMIT University

Purpose

This paper aims to assess the impact and value of non‐binding agreements or declarations in achieving sustainability in universities.

Design/methodology/approach

A case study of Royal Melbourne ...


Shaping the Education of Tomorrow: 2012 Full-length Report on the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development

  • UNESCO
  • Wageningen University

This report represents the second review of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development and is conducted in the context of its Global Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (GMEF). The ...


Turnaround Leadership for Sustainability in Higher Education

  • Western Sydney University (NSW)
  • Australian National University
  • University of Gloucestershire (Gloucestershire)

Universities play a central role in addressing key challenges of social, economic and environmental sustainability. For this role to be delivered effectively it is critical to identify not only what ...


Lights Out Starter Kit

  • University of Texas at Austin (TX)

In April 2013, a student energy conservation organization, Longhorn Lights Out, began on the UT Austin campus. This organization, sponsored by UT's Energy and Water Conservation Program, encouraged students ...


UC San Diego Earth Day: Annual Sustainability Fair & Tree Planting

  • University of California, San Diego (CA)

UC San Diego celebrated Earth Day with student organizations, campus departments and vendors at their annual sustainability fair. Tablers included: AQUAholics, ASEJA, CALPIRG, Dr. Bronner, EcoGrounds, EcoNauts, EWS, Green Office ...


The Essex Report: Workshop on the Principles of Sustainability in Higher Education

  • Second Nature (MA)
  • Association of University Leaders for a Sustainable Future (DC)

In February of 1995, a workshop at the Essex Conference Center of Essex, Massachusetts brought together thirty-two educators and other professionals with environmental expertise to discuss the principles of sustainability ...


A mathematical decision-making procedure to assist in the development of sustainability plans based on the STARS framework

  • Dominican University of California (CA)

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to establish an objective mathematical decision-making procedure to help universities prioritize credits, while using the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System (STARS) framework ...


Sustainability assessment in higher education institutions: The STARS system

Sustainable development is a concern for countries, businesses and organizations sensitive to excess in terms of utilized resources. This is evident in international initiatives which aim to establish guiding principles ...


Benchmarking tools for assessing and tracking sustainability in higher educational institutions: Identifying an effective tool for the University of Saskatchewan

  • University of Saskatchewan (SK)

Purpose

The University of Saskatchewan (UofS) has indentified five areas of campus life critical to improving the university's sustainability performance: education, research, operations, governance, and community engagement. In recognition ...


The state of sustainability reporting at Canadian universities

  • University of Waterloo (ON)

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to describe the state of sustainability reporting in Canada's higher education sector, while understanding who is reporting on sustainability performance, how is ...


Higher education for today and tomorrow: university appraisal for diversity, innovation and change towards sustainable development

  • United Nations University

This article serves as a position paper of a consortium of universities in the Asia–Pacific region working to address challenges of sustainable development and rapidly changing social, economic and ...


2016 Earth Week at UC Berkeley

  • University of California, Berkeley (CA)

The culmination of UC Berkeley student sustainability actions is most prominent during UC Berkeley’s annual Earth Week celebration. UC Berkeley students have designated Earth Week as the time to ...

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.

PA 1: Sustainability Coordination

PA 2: Sustainability Coordination

PA 3: Sustainability Coordination

PA 4: Reporting Assurance

Additional analysis on scores and quantitative fields can be conducted using the STARS Benchmarking Tool.

Coordination & Planning Partners