"UNH Achieves Gold Rating in Sustainability" - 9/19/11

“University of New Hampshire Achieves Gold Rating in Sustainability”

by Ella Nilsen

9/19/11

            The University of New Hampshire will be starting out the academic year with the completion of an important milestone.  As of August, UNH became one of twenty-four colleges and universities to achieve a gold rating from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education’s (AASHE) STARS program. 

            STARS is a program that ranks colleges and universities according to their sustainability.  It is a highly regarded and widely used program that has set the standard for sustainability in higher education.  286 campuses have registered for STARS, which ranks a school’s sustainability in four categories: bronze, silver, gold, and platinum.  Out of those 286, only twenty-four have made it to the gold category.  None so far have made platinum.

            “Sustainability is part of our DNA at UNH, so it will always be a defining feature of our identity,” wrote university president Mark Huddleston in a letter to AASHE executive director.  Huddleston was referring to the school’s distinguished record of sustainability in a wide range of areas, including education and curriculum, research, and university operations and development.

            “We did really well,” said Sara Cleaves, Associate Director of the UNH Sustainability Academy.  “We have an endowed sustainability program with 5-6 fulltime people…most campuses don’t have that.”  Cleaves said that areas of UNH sustainability rated highest by STARS included the growing curriculum and educational programs that UNH offers its students as well as its sustainability administration and planning. 

            Areas where the university needs to improve?  “Operations was actually our worst area,” Cleaves said.  “We need to up our recycling numbers, and our waste minimization and we need to up the number of people doing transit.  We need to keep upping the ante, because all that is going to take more than what we’re doing.”  UNH plans to keep working on the areas that need help, all with the goal of making it the first STARS platinum school in the nation.