Summer 2008

Green Activities Flourish on Campus

During the past year, the Rose-Hulman campus has made a major commitment to "going green" in all campus activities.

President Gerald Jakubowski committed the college to climate neutrality when he signed the American College & University President's Climate Commitment last year. A major part of the Rose-Hulman effort has been the establishment of a Sustainability Team that includes staff, faculty and student representation.

The group seeks to promote the responsible management of resources through the reduction of waste, shared learning and community involvement, according to Tuesday Strong, chair of the sustainability team. "We are working to unite efforts on campus to promote a culture of sustainability that reduces our environmental footprint while contributing to the development of our students as leaders and responsible citizens."

Some of the day-to-day policies put in effect include the following:

• Green cleaning throughout campus;
• Touchless soap and paper dispensers in all buildings;
• Nighttime temperature setbacks in large areas; and
• Replacing incandescent bulbs with energy-saving fluorescent lights.

Other activities under way include an on-campus recycling program, a campus-wide sustainability assessment along with testing occupancy sensors and waterless urinals.

Also, the campus has:

• Conducted two electronic-waste days on campus where old computers, printers, and monitors were collected and taken to an electronic recycling center;
• Committed to donating $2 to Trees, Inc., for every laptop computer purchase annually; with funds to go toward the purchase of trees to counteract the generation greenhouse gases;
• Became one of 90 colleges to pilot a sustainability rating system for higher education;
• Coordinated a campus Earth Day celebration;
• Collected more than six tons of recyclable material during the middle of the school year;
• Prepared a grant proposal to expand the campus recycling center; and
• Took an inventory of greenhouse gas emissions on campus.

For more information about Rose- Hulman's on-campus activities concerning sustainability, visit the team Web page at www.rose-hulman.edu/sustainability. Also, read the President's Climate Commitment at http://www.presidentsclimatecommitment.org/.