Oberlin College

Curriculum

• Environmental Studies Program
• One of the many student research projects currently taking place is a complete swap of several public housing units' incandescent light bulbs for energy efficient CFLs. The results will reveal how much money and carbon are saved by switching a home completely over to CFLs. 

Administrative Committee(s)

• The Committee on Environmental Sustainability at Oberlin College consists of faculty, staff, students, and community members. The purpose of the committee is to implement the College’s environmental policy.

Green Building

• Oberlin’s Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies 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.
• The Phyllis Litoff Building, a jazz studies building, has broken ground in the summer of 2008. The building, designed by Westlake Reed Leskosky, will be the first music facility in the world to attain a LEED-Gold rating.
• A new residence hall is in the early planning stages and the architects for the project have been given a charge of attaining a LEED-Gold rating.
• In June of 2006, the Oberlin College Board of Trustees voted to seek at least LEED- Silver certification for all future new buildings and major renovations.
• SEED House (see Student Groups) has lowered its electricity consumption 50% in the past year by changing behavior and increasing efficiency.

Purchasing

• Oberlin’s Green Purchasing Policy lays out criteria, goals and an implementation plan.

Energy

• Several dorms are connected to the Campus Resource Monitoring System, providing real-time feedback on energy use (Oberlin.edu/dormenergy)
• Oberlin has a green energy purchasing agreement with their local utility resulting in about 40% of their electricity coming from carbon-neutral sources
• As part of its contract with Aramark for facilities planning and construction services, a full-time energy manager has been hired for the College.
• Working with an outside energy consultant and the energy manager, comprehensive energy audits are being conducted for most campus buildings.

Food

• Oberlin Student Cooperative Association (OSCA) is a 1.78 million dollar non-profit corporation that feeds 630 and houses 175 Oberlin College students. OSCA has a composting program and gets 15% of its food from local sources
• Oberlin uses Bon Appetit Management Company for its dining hall food services. Bon Appetit is committed to local food sources and has programs such as Farm to Fork and The Low Carbon Diet. It is estimated that 1/3 of Oberlin’s dining hall food comes from local sources.
• To reduce the consumption of plastic take-out containers in Dascomb dining hall, the CDS Recyclers instituted a program that allows students to take out food in reusable containers.
• Students have performed food waste audits to increase awareness regarding food waste on campus.

Grounds

• The college has provided land and support for the creation of six experimental wetland restoration cells on the George Jones Memorial Farm, a college-owned organic farm.
• The grounds surrounding the Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies integrate native ecosystems into the landscaping.
• Integrated Pest Management Practices are used to manage the College’s grounds.

Transportation

• Oberlin’s safety and security officers drive hybrid vehicles
• Part of Oberlin’s student activities fee subsidizes Lorain County Transit
• The Oberlin Bike Co-Op is a cooperatively run bicycle repair, rental, and education center serving. The project began in 1986.
• CityWheels has two cars available on campus for carsharing members.

Recycling

• Oberlin’s Recycling Program
• The facilities department hires Recycling Assistants every year. These students to promote recycling projects on campus.
• The Recycling Assistants and Source Reduction Assistants collect one-sided paper from computer labs to turn into recycled notepads for students and offices.
• The College has stopped buying fluorescent paper and now buys office paper from BFI. Cutting out fluorescent paper makes the paper easier to recycle and reduces the amount of toxic sludge produced through processing.
• Oberlin has several Abitibi Consolidated Paper Retriever bins and receives money for every ton of paper recycled.
• The Recycling Assistants focus on source reduction—trying to use fewer resources—by buying environmentally friendly products, buying fewer products, eating whole foods, and being conscious of water and energy use.

Events

• Dorm Energy Competitions & Research: From their website: “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. … Key findings include: an average reduction in electricity usage of 32% during the competition; 68,000 kWh, $5,100 and 150,000 lbs of CO2 emissions 1,400 lbs of SO2 and 500 lbs of NOx saved; 4,000 hits on the Dorm Energy website during the competition. In a post-competition survey, dormitory residents reported developing resource saving strategies that they intended to continue at Oberlin and elsewhere.
• The Ecolympics is an environmentally-minded competition between the residence halls at Oberlin College. Participants compete in a variety of events to earn points for their dorms, with the grand prize being awarded during April 26th's Closing Ceremonies.
• The Lighbulb Brigade happens every so often when volunteers go door-to-door in the dorms to replace incandescent bulbs in students' lamps with energy efficienct CFLs. The bulbs are free and are donated by Oberlin College Facilities since they will save money on the electricity!

Website

• Oberlin.edu/sustainability

Contact

Nathan Engstrom
Oberlin College Sustainability Coordinator
Nathan.Engstrom@oberlin.edu

Student Groups

• Recycled Products Co-Op (RPC): The ultimate mission of the Recycled Products Coop (RPC) is to provide affordable recycled office supplies to the Oberlin community at large, specifically Oberlin College students and other interested parties.
• Oberlin Student Cooperative Association (OSCA) (see food section)
• SEED (Student Experiment in Ecological Design) House: sustainable living themed student house
• The Green EDGE (Ecological Design and General Efficiency) Fund is an example of a revolving loan fund that loans money for student-designed campus energy conservation projects and returns the energy savings to the fund as interest
• Oberlin SUDS (Sustainable Union for Detergents and Soaps)

Has the President of the College signed the American College and University President’s Climate Commitment?
Yes

Extras
Professor John Petersen had an article published in The Chronicle of Higher Education titled "A Green Curriculum Involves Everyone on the Campus."