Furman University has earned a STARS Gold Rating from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) in recognition of its sustainability achievements across the campus.<\/p>\n
Furman will celebrate the university\u2019s new \u201cgold\u201d status with a special event on the James B. Duke Library porch Tuesday, March 24 from 12:30-2 p.m.\u00a0 The celebration will include remarks by President Elizabeth Davis at 12:45 p.m.<\/p>\n
STARS, the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System,\u00a0measures and encourages sustainability in all aspects of higher education.\u00a0 Furman\u2019s STARS report<\/a> is publicly available on the STARS website<\/a>.<\/p>\n With more than 650 participants on six continents, AASHE\u2019s STARS program is the most widely recognized framework in the world for publicly reporting comprehensive information related to a college or university\u2019s sustainability performance. Participants report achievements in four overall areas: 1) operations 2) academics, 3) engagement and 4) planning, administration. Furman\u2019s high scores in academics and engagement reflect the university\u2019s distinctive community-based, and interdisciplinary approach to sustainability teaching, research, and partnerships.<\/p>\n \u201cSTARS was developed by the campus sustainability community to provide high standards for recognizing campus sustainability efforts,\u201d says AASHE Executive Director Meghan Fay Zahniser. \u201cFurman has demonstrated a substantial commitment to sustainability by achieving a STARS Gold Rating and is to be congratulated for their efforts.\u201d<\/p>\n Says Yancey Fouch\u00e9, Associate Director of Furman\u2019s Shi Center for Sustainability, \u201cOnly 94 institutions have reported under the latest, most stringent version of STARS, and of those, 38 achieved a gold rating. That\u2019s quite an accomplishment for Furman, and even more noteworthy since Furman is among just a few institutions in the Southeast to achieve the gold rating.\u201d<\/p>\n Unlike other rating or ranking systems, the program is open to all institutions of higher education, and the criteria that determine a STARS rating are transparent and accessible to anyone. Because STARS is a program based on credits earned, it allows for both internal comparisons as well as comparisons with similar institutions.<\/p>\n For more information, contact Yancey Fouch\u00e9 at the David E. Shi Center for Sustainability at (864) 294-3656, or yancey.fouche@furman.edu<\/a>.<\/p>\n About AASHE<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n AASHE is an association of colleges and universities working to create a sustainable future. AASHE\u2019s mission is to empower higher education to lead the sustainability transformation. It provides resources, professional development and a network of support to enable institutions of higher education to model and advance sustainability in everything they do, from governance and operations to education and research. For more information about AASHE, visit www.aashe.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Furman has earned a STARS Gold Rating from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) in recognition of its sustainability achievements across the campus. The university will celebrate its new \u201cgold\u201d status with a special event on the James B. Duke Library porch Tuesday, March 24 from 12:30-2 p.m. The celebration will include remarks by President Elizabeth Davis at 12:45 p.m. The Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System\u2122 (STARS) measures and encourages sustainability in all aspects of higher education. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":265,"featured_media":3625,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,6,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-centers-and-institutes","category-in-the-news","category-shi-institute-for-sustainable-communities"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/265"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3624"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3624\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}