Evaluating Campus Stewardship Programs: 12 Benchmarks of Success

…Used with permission of the National Wildlife Federation. For the full text, consult Keniry, J. Ecodemia: Campus Environmental Stewardship at the turn of the 21^st Century (Washington: National Wildlife Federation, 1995), pp. 187-204.

…There is no template for making an environmental program an irrevocable part of the structure and policy of an institution. But the characteristics which distinguish the most successful and enduring programs can serve as a guide to broadening and institutionalizing environmental stewardship - and as benchmarks for measuring the success of that effort. Although several of the 12 benchmarks which follow measure successes on the policy level, policy changes often result from initiatives at the grassroots.

1. Executive Support
   …In many of the most successful stewardship initiatives, executive staff play crucial roles. [They] have helped make possible a broad range of initiatives on campuses, including the development of environmental policy; the establishment of a committee or other structure to encourage environmental accountability and innovation; the development of new specifications for purchasing, investment, and research; and the incorporation of ecological criteria into plans for new buildings and infrastructure.
2. Policy
   … When it is supported by senior administrators, written environmental policy can help ensure that commitment to ecology survives among competing priorities, limited funds, and perpetual turnover in campus leadership.
3. Resources and Incentives
   …The provision of resources and incentives, both for launching new programs and to increase participation in existing ones, has helped ensure the success of many campus stewardship initiatives.
4. Structural Framework
   …Structures may be as simple as a small committee or as complex as several intersecting committees and task forces to facilitate communication between departments.
5. Curriculum
   …When woven into the curriculum, environmental responsibility becomes part of the fabric of academic life.
6. Research
   …An institution can make great contributions to pollution prevention and ecology through its academic research.
7. Ecological Planning and Design
   …Incorporating ecological concerns into the design of buildings and campuses is a new challenge for most campuses…[Some projects have included] campus provisions for renewable energy and energy efficiency, nontoxic and recycled-content building materials, native landscaping, appropriate siting of buildings and plants, bicycle parking, water recycling and conservation, and ease of recycling.
8. Sense of Place
   …Many campus environmental groups struggle desperately to galvanize student and staff support and involvement. Although there are no pat solutions to this problem, the programs that lure people into natural areas on campus and in the community often elicit the most enthusiasm and the highest levels of participation.
9. Measurable Reduction of Cost and Waste
   …Rigorous analysis buttresses "feel-good" programs with the quantifiable results necessary to win institutional support. By measuring their success in ways which dramatize connections between individual actions and the larger world, program managers can give participants campus-wide a crucial sense of efficacy and accomplishment.
10. Public Relations and Documentation
    …Hand in hand with measuring the impact of a program comes publicizing the results.
11. Financial Accountability
    …As colleges and universities form environmental policies and put them into practice on campus, they are beginning to extend these expectations to the companies with which they do business. Shifts in college spending often begin with purchasing. Rutgers University, the University of Minnesota, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and others have created environmentally sensitive specifications for dozens of contracts, including papers, construction, and office equipment.
12. Leadership Development and Training
    …Campus environmental stewards must remember to invest close to home, too. If the lessons learned on campus are to be applied in the larger world, leaders must be trained for the task…campuses should invest the time and money necessary to offer training programs on environmental skills and leadership development.