DU improved with a B+ on its Sustainability Report Card released by the Sustainable Endowments Institute last Wednesday. 

Last year, DU received a B for its efforts to lessen the school’s impact on the environment and the school’s policies on sustainability.

Grades are based on 48 indicators in nine categories. The categories are administration, climate change and energy, food and recycling, green building, student involvement, transportation, endowment transparency, shareholder engagement and investment priorities.

“DU did very well, and improved its overall grade from last year. Only 26 schools out of the total 332 received A- grades, so a B+ grade is still very impressive. Overall, 45 percent of schools received a grade in the B range,” said Cameron Bruns, a member of the Sustainable Endowments Institutes’ research team.

Once the grades were assigned for each of the categories, the overall grade was determined using the 4.0 grade point average scale. 

Data was collected on DU and its sustainability practices from public sources as well as by talking to school officials, dining service officials and students.

DU received an A in the administration, climate change and energy, student involvement and investment priorities categories.

DU received a B in food and recycling, green building and transportation categories.

DU’s lowest score was in endowment transparency where DU only received a C.

DU was not graded in the shareholder engagement category since it is a private institution. 

Since the Sustainable Endowments Institute was founded in 2005, it has seen a steady increase in the grades that have been awarded each year.  The institute focuses only on higher education institutions.

The 300 schools in the US and Canada with the highest endowments were graded along with 32 additional schools that asked to participate.

Six other Colorado schools were graded as well.  The University of Colorado at Boulder was one of the 26 schools to receive an A-, while Colorado College received a B+, University of Colorado at Colorado Springs received a B, Colorado State University received a C+ and the Colorado School of Mines received a D+.

The full Sustainability Report Card can be found at www.greenreportcard.org.

 

 

Grades by category

• Administration: A
• Climate change and energy: A
• Student involvement: A
• Investment priorities: A
• Food and recycling: B
• Green building: B
• Transportation: B
• Endowment transparency: C
• Shareholder engagement: N/A