For the complete list of sustainability initiatives at 12 campuses in Northeast Ohio, click here.

Northeast Ohio Campus Sustainability Best Practices

Curriculum
Green Building
Purchasing
Energy
Food
Grounds
Transportation
Waste Reduction
Events
Featured Student Groups

Curriculum

Sustainability Major, Baldwin Wallace
New sustainability major planned to start in the fall of 2009 will be an interdisciplinary major with required internships and professional advisors.

Green Academy, Cuyahoga Community College
The Green Academy and Center for Sustainability (GACS) will launch “Pathways out of Poverty through Green Collar Jobs,” a workforce development effort that provides the growing green business community with a skilled workforce and promotes green entrepreneurial spirit.

Campus Sustainability Course, Oberlin College
Engages students in various aspects of solving sustainability problems on campus. Themes change from year to year but include issues pertaining to energy consumption, water use, materials, food, transportation, and waste handling as well as technical matters of measurement standards and metrics to analyze data. Students conduct analysis of technical options to improve efficiency, and strategies to promote organizational learning relative to climate and environment.

Green Building

Ernsthausen Hall, Baldwin-Wallace College
Ernsthausen Hall is the first and only dorm in Ohio with geo-thermal heating and cooling.

The Village @ 115, Case Western Reserve University
The Village @ 115 is LEED Silver with one LEED Gold building. In addition to green building features such as light shelves, motion detectors, low-flow plumbing fixtures, and a groundwater recharge system, The Village @ 115 also has informational kiosks in each residential house so that students can see their real-time electricity, steam, and water use.

Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies, Oberlin College
The Adam Joseph Lewis Center (AJLC) was conceived as an integrated building-landscape system that would function as a core component of Oberlin’s Environmental Studies curriculum. The building relies on both active and passive systems to heat, cool, and ventilate while getting its electricity from the 160-kW photovoltaic array located on the roof of the building and the parking pavilion next to the building. The landscape produces food, restores native ecosystems, and retains storm water. The Living Machine cleans and recycles wastewater for use in the building and landscape. The AJLC has won many architectural awards including One of the 30 Milestone Buildings of the 20th Century from the U.S. Department of Energy.

SEED (Student Experiment in Ecological Design) House, Oberlin College
SEED House is a theme-housing option focused on sustainable living. The 8-person house has lowered its electricity consumption 50% in the past year by changing behavior and increasing efficiency.

Purchasing

Energy Star Appliances, Lorain County Community College
All new energy equipment and systems are “Energy Star” rated.

Energy

Adopt-a-Building Program, Case Western Reserve University
The University’s Adopt-a-Building program attracts Volunteer Energy Ambassadors to act as energy conservation advocates in campus buildings. Motion Sensors, Case Western Reserve University Motion sensors and efficient lighting fixtures have been installed in the library

Dorm Energy Monitoring, Oberlin College
Several dorms are connected to the Campus Resource Monitoring System, providing real-time feedback on energy use.

Renewable Energy, Oberlin College
In addition to the 160-kW solar array associated with the Adam Joseph Lewis Center, Oberlin has a green energy purchasing agreement with their local utility resulting in about 40% of their electricity coming from carbon-neutral sources

Food

Local Food Commitments, Case Western Reserve University, Hiram College, and Oberlin College
Case, Oberlin (Bon Appetit), and Hiram (AVI) have committed to buying 30% local food. Bon Appetit also has programs such as Farm to Fork and The Low Carbon Diet.

Trayless Tuesdays, John Carroll University
John Carroll hosts “Trayless Tuesdays,” a program established in Schott Dining Hall to raise awareness about world hunger. By not taking a tray, students are encouraged to take only as much food as they will eat, reducing waste 10-15%.

Rolled Hand Towels, Lorain County Community College
There was a 25% reduction in waste from switching from folded hand towels to rolled hand towels.

Oberlin Student Cooperative Association (OSCA), Oberlin College
OSCA is a 1.78 million dollar non-profit that feeds 630 and houses 175 Oberlin College students. OSCA has a composting program and prioritizes local food.

Grounds

Tree Inventory, Cuyahoga Community College
All three campuses at Tri-C have inventory of all trees growing on campus, their condition, and recommendations for maintenance.

Less Mowing, Lorain County Community College
LCCC has reduced the amount of mowing they do by about 15%

Green Space, University of Akron
The University of Akron has planted 2,800 new trees which absorb 14 tons of CO2 per year. The green space throughout campus helps reduce heat islands.

Transportation

Subsidized Public Transit, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland State University
Students at these universities have unlimited RTA access through the UPass program. The program is funded by a $25 student fee.

Community Bikes, Hiram College
Community Bikes is a sub-program of the Student Environmental Action Coalition (SEAC) that started 5 years ago. They take in donated or broken bikes, fix them up, paint them yellow, and distribute them around camps so that anyone can use them!

Bike Co-Op, Oberlin College
The Oberlin Bike Co-Op is a cooperatively run bicycle repair, rental, and education center serving Oberlin, Ohio. The project began in 1986.

CityWheels, Oberlin College
CityWheels was introduced in Oberlin in 2006 and currently has a Scion XB and a Toyota Prius for students, faculty, staff, and community members to share.

Waste Reduction

Paper Use Reduction, Baldwin Wallace College
BW has reduced their paper consumption by 40% by making double-sided printing default on all campus printers as well as capping the number of free pages students get each semester.

Composting, Baldwin Wallace College
A composter has been installed that will take all food waste out of the waste stream.

Reducing the Amount of Paper Documents, Mount Union College
Mount Union has begun replacing numerous paper documents with electronic alternates. The faculty and staff directory is online as is the course catalog, faculty and other personnel handbook, and most forms. All grades are reported to the registrar electronically and room reservations, IT equipment order, vehicle reservations are all handled online.

Events

Sustain-a-palooza, Case Western Reserve University
Sustain-a-palooza is an on-campus event to highlight the range of environmental and sustainability activities happening around Northeast Ohio was held during the first week of school this year. Eighteen organizations and 300 people attended the event! The goals for the event were:

• Raise awareness about the many ways people can make more sustainable choices in their lives
• Highlight the diverse programs and approaches Case and other organizations are taking to promote conservation and the environment
• Provide ideas and opportunities for getting involved

Dorm Energy Competition, Oberlin College
From their website: “Oberlin faculty and students in the Environmental Studies Program and the Psychology Department are engaged in collaborative research on the effects of the Campus Resource Monitoring System on the dorm residents' attitudes, behaviors and knowledge related to the environment. As an integral component of this work, an annual two week long dormitory energy competition is conducted to see which dorms can reduce their resource use by the largest percentage. A study that took place during the 2005 Dorm Energy Competition successfully demonstrated that resource use feedback systems motivate students to exhibit substantial short-term reductions in energy and water use in dormitories."

Featured Student Groups

Green EDGE (Ecological Design and General Efficiency) Fund, Oberlin College
The Green EDGE Fund loans money for student-designed campus energy conservation projects and returns the energy savings to the fund as interest.