Solutions+for+Sustainability

From: Teri Butler, Lyceum Academy, New Hanover High School RE: How Green is My School…alook at Practical Sustainability for Your immediate future! Since most of mystudents are college bound seniors, I came up with the following. Pleasefeel free to rip it to shreds.. I plan to distrubute it later this week!

By now, most of you have a goodidea where you will be next year. But how much do you know aboutyour future //alma mater//? Not where the dining hall is, or which isthe best/worst dorm. But, you know, the important stuff. Like: What are the university’s efforts to minimize food waste in thedining halls? Are there any green buildings on campus? Are theschool’s investment priorities focused around a sustainable world? Assignment: Evaluate yourschool’s sustainability efforts. I have posted two links on Edine (underlinks) which feature Green Rankings as well as categories for manyscores. Your job is to evaluate and summarize what best practices are alreadyin place in your school. These may be things like instructing students onhow to maximize efficiency and minimize electricity waste with computers (likethey do at Warren Wilson), recycling efforts (like at UNCW), stores thatdistribute ‘used’ goods (there’s one at UNC-A), on-campus bio-fueledtransportation (yea UC-Davis!). You get it. Use the list below to getstarted. For part 2, you need to come upwith 3 things that could be added to the campus/community of your future hometo make it a greener place. These must be fully explained and theirimpact must be stated. Again, use the list below to get started. For each of the categories below,you must include at least two things currently being done on campus OR twoactivities that could be added. Your product must be in the formof an easy-to-read summary, such as would be presented to the board of trusteesor the senior administration of the school in order to maintain or increase thesustainability of the institution. I would suggest a table/chart,with expanded explanations on subsequent pages. Now, if you have not settled on aschool, or if school still remains in the future for you, feel free to evaluatea potential future school. Who knows? It might influence yourdecision! I encourage all of you to work together. You may formgroups of three (3), but each group must evaluate a single school. Pleasenote that there are several published lists of the ‘greenest schools’, but theydiffer in what they evaluate and which they determine to be the greenest, souse them as a spring board, but not as a definitive list. Due date: Friday, May 20th.
 * energy use
 * climate change
 * food
 * recycling
 * green buildings
 * transportation
 * investment priorities
 * student involvement in environmental groups
 * a new category of your own invention