Syracuse University is looking to improve student participation in sustainability efforts after receiving a C for student involvement in the 2011 College Sustainability Report Card for the third year in a row. 

The Report Card, released Oct. 27, is an evaluation of more than 300 universities from all 50 states and eight Canadian provinces. The report is in its fifth year and evaluates schools in areas such as administration, climate change and energy, food and recycling, green building, student involvement, transportation and financial categories.

SU scored an overall grade of a B, the same as last year, and only eight of the schools graded in New York scored higher. Rick Martin, principal sustainability analyst at SU, said SU did improve from last year, but still received the same grade because every year standards become more difficult.

‘I would have preferred to see our grade go up overall, but some of the individual components went up, and that’s all we have control over,’ Martin said.

SU’s C grade in student involvement could be because many of the sustainability projects around campus are not visible or accessible to students, Martin said. Water conservation, renewable energy sources and other energy-efficient techniques are not tangible to the average student, so it is hard for students to be more involved, Martin said. 

‘It’s hard to be interested in something that you can’t see,’ Martin said. 

But Martin said new projects on campus such as the renovations to the College of Visual and Performing Arts and the rain garden on Waverly Avenue are two truly visible sustainability projects. He said he expects student involvement to rise.

‘More projects on campus will start to make people more aware of what’s going on,’ Martin said.

Sustainability is incorporated into first-year orientation with the focus on ‘healthy people, healthy economy, healthy planet,’ said Keenyn Wald, co-chair of the Civic Engagement and Sustainability Committee. Students are taught during their first floor meetings to recycle certain materials into the designated bins and are encouraged to not waste food in the dining halls, he said. 

Student involvement was somewhat helped by the fact that the university offers one graduate assistant position in sustainability. There are no paid sustainability internships for undergraduate students, but the addition of a program like that would help boost student involvement, Wald said.

The Office of Resident Life is implementing a program called ‘Tap Into Water,’ Wald said. The program is based around bottled water and how it negatively affects the environment, so dorms across campus are encouraging reusable water bottles and water filters. 

In addition, Wald said residence life is experimenting with water timers, which are like egg timers that would suction to the shower and provide students with a countdown to aim for shorter showers.

SU received its lowest grade, a D, in the category of shareholder engagement. SU earned a D last year and an F in 2009. Barbara Wells, the treasurer for Business, Finance and Administrative Services, said because SU is a private university, it is not obligated to release all financial information. This could attribute for the low marks, but the documents on asset allocation are available to the public on the SU treasurer’s website.

SU maintained a B in the food and recycling category, but dining halls have made efforts to purchase fruit, vegetables, dairy and meat products locally whenever they can. They have also recently implemented a composting program partnering with the Onondaga County Resource Recovery Agency, Wald said.

SU received an A in the climate change and energy category, as it did last year. Steve Lloyd, the associate director of sustainability at SU, said it is largely because of extensive progress the university has made on the Climate Action Plan, SU’s pledge to be more sustainable.

‘Our Climate Action Plan is different than any other institution’s because ours is not based on specific buildings,’ Lloyd said. ‘We are doing it in a fiscally responsible manner, and through technology, behavior change and building upgrades, we can get this program to be self-sufficient by 2023.’

The Climate Action Plan is going school by school, starting with VPA. Lloyd said there are 10 buildings on campus VPA primarily uses, and the Sustainability Division is planning to make VPA environmentally friendly through changes in energy, water use, lighting and other behavior and sustainability practices. 

The sustainability team has been in contact with a design contractor to discuss the major problems with the buildings and then go through the process of fixing them. Lloyd said the team expects to do this for every school at SU if everything goes according to plan.

In addition, Lloyd said SU purchases 12 percent of all energy from renewable sources, and 20 percent of electricity comes from low-impact power sources, which is renewable because it takes in natural gas.

‘It is better for the environment, but we do pay a little extra,’ Lloyd said. ‘The percentage will go up if the economy holds out. A lot of things have been put on hold due to the economy.’

hawentz@syr.edu

Published on November 7, 2010 at 12:00 pm