Every year, the CWRU Office of Energy & Sustainability turns in data from a myriad of departments on campus to the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education’s (AASHE) Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System (STARS). This information is used by the Princeton Review and other groups to rank CWRU’s sustainability work against other institutes of higher education.
The Princeton Review recently released its annual Guide to Green Colleges. CWRU was again on the list with the same score as last year: 96 out of a possible 99. This year, 413 schools are in the Guide out of nearly 700 schools that were surveyed.
Last year, CWRU was listed on the Top 50 Green Colleges List with the same score of 96. This year, schools listed at the bottom of the Top 50 list have a 96 as well but CWRU did not make it into the top group. Those not in the top 50 do not get a ranking, just a listing within the overall guide.
“More schools are making a commitment to the environment as CWRU has,” remarked CWRU’s Office of Energy & Sustainability Director, Stephanie Corbett. “We’re excited that other colleges and universities are doing such a great job with their green efforts but disappointed that we didn’t make it on the Princeton Review’s Top 50 List this year. It’s a lesson learned that we need to keep improving.”
Twenty four institutions also received a score of 96. The Office of Energy & Sustainability has been told by the Princeton Review that there were distinctions between institutions with the same score through student surveys, STARS scores, percentage of local food and so forth. CWRU was not surveyed by Princeton this year and obtained a Silver ranking with STARS in 2018 with a score of 58.96 (Gold is 65 points.).
Rob Franek, The Princeton Review’s Editor-in-Chief, cited findings of a survey by The Princeton Review indicating a high level of interest among college applicants and their parents about environmental and sustainability issues. This year, a solid majority (64%) of the 11,900 teens and parents that the company polled for its 2019 College Hopes & Worries Survey said that having information about a college's commitment to the environment would affect their decision to apply to or attend the school.
The Princeton Review sustainability scores and details can be found on the Campus Life tab on CWRU’s profile.