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STARS: Challenges and Opportunities for Implementation

STARS: Challenges and Opportunities for Implementation Josh Kaplan, Sustainability Outreach Specialist Office of Sustainability Presented to AASHE Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Oct. 12, 2011. Overview. Goals of STARS Participants Methodology Findings Conclusion. Background. STARS is*:

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STARS: Challenges and Opportunities for Implementation

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  1. STARS: Challenges and Opportunities for Implementation Josh Kaplan, Sustainability Outreach Specialist Office of Sustainability Presented to AASHE Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Oct. 12, 2011

  2. Overview • Goals of STARS • Participants • Methodology • Findings • Conclusion american.edu/sustainability

  3. Background • STARS is*: • Voluntary, self-reporting framework • A guide for advancing sustainability in all sectors of higher education • Common standard of measurement for sustainability in higher education • A tool that promotes a comprehensive understanding of sustainability that includes its social, economic, and environmental dimensions STARS as a Sustainability Claim, The Emphasis of STARS, and Conducting a STARS Report Is STARS “working”? The paper presents its recommendations in the context of advancing sustainability across higher education in order to help STARS better achieve its goals and gain increased market uptake among institutions worldwide. *“STARS Overview”, AASHE, 2010 american.edu/sustainability

  4. Who’s Participating? 39 institutions submitted reports between 9/13/10 and 3/2/11 american.edu/sustainability

  5. Who’s Participating? Most early STARS participants categorized as Research/Very High and achieved rating of Silver american.edu/sustainability

  6. Evaluating STARS american.edu/sustainability

  7. STARS as a Sustainability Claim American University quickly trumpeted its achievement american.edu/sustainability

  8. STARS as a Sustainability Claim american.edu/sustainability

  9. STARS as a Sustainability Claim american.edu/sustainability

  10. STARS as a Sustainability Claim american.edu/sustainability

  11. Emphasis of STARS • Examples: • Inspiring a campus to define sustainability in curriculum and research • Organizing existing initiatives in a logical fashion • Providing better documentation of policy and practice • Integrating sustainability into staff orientations and performance reviews american.edu/sustainability

  12. Emphasis of STARS • 95% disagreed or were neutral • STARS does not have a real or perceived bias toward these sort of projects • Example: Easier to “pick the low hanging fruit” and achieve Tier 2 credits (fewer points) by emphasizing actions like energy efficiency than by completing large projects that result in Tier 1 credits (more points) in climate and energy. american.edu/sustainability

  13. Emphasis of STARS american.edu/sustainability

  14. Conducting a STARS Report american.edu/sustainability

  15. Emphasis of STARS american.edu/sustainability

  16. Emphasis of STARS • Administrators • Faculty • Undergraduates • Graduate Students • Facilities Staff • Housekeeping Staff • Other Staff • Local Government(s) • State Government(s) • Neighboring Communities american.edu/sustainability

  17. american.edu/sustainability

  18. Emphasis of STARS • Involving a wide variety of campus offices, especially those not related to sustainability • Surveying sustainability-focused and related courses, as sustainability as an administrative department can separated from the academic arm of the institution • A lack of a detailed methodology for the course inventory • Finding adequate time to complete the report & completing report by deadlines; collection very labor intensive • Institutional data systems not designed to provide data of the type required by STARS; particular problem with facilities data /lack of a centralized data collection system • Lack of consistent and reliable data for certain criteria • Too many points being inaccessible to 2-year institutions • Gathering data on investments run by state governments, unions, or larger university systems • Involving groups to work on just one credit area american.edu/sustainability

  19. Summary american.edu/sustainability

  20. Conclusions • The greatest challenges in submitting a report are gathering data across disparate systems, fully engaging all campus units, and tailoring metrics to meet the requirements of STARS criteria • STARS has the potential to be adopted by a wide variety of institutions • Upgrades will have to be made to subsequent versions of STARS in order to gain prevalence • Higher education is uniquely poised to lead the sustainability movement american.edu/sustainability

  21. Thank you! AU Office of Sustainability • sustainability@american.edu • www.american.edu/sustainability • Twitter.com/GreenAU • facebook.com/GreenAU american.edu/sustainability

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