Media

OTTAWA, September 22, 2010  —  The University of Ottawa is among the founding members of the Sustainable Tracking Assessment & Rating System (STARS). This new system is administered by the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) and is a one-of-a-kind program aimed at changing the way universities deal with the environment and society at large.

STARS is a scoring system with 300 available points spread across three categories: education and research, operations as well as planning, administration and engagement. The wide assortment of credits allotted ensures that each institution takes a “big picture” approach to sustainability. The list of possible credits ranges from things like sustainability in new student orientation to storm water management and sustainability policy advocacy.

Far from a simple administrative exercise, STARS is unlike any other rating system. The program requires that the final results be approved and signed off on by the president of the university and that the results be made public. This ensures a high level of accountability and allows AASHE to rank the institutions according to their sustainability performance.

Furthermore, the system will allow for both internal comparisons as well as comparisons with similar institutions, essentially creating a network of institutions that will reinforce each other’s efforts. The submission process can be quite lengthy and complex, requiring up to one year to complete. The University of Ottawa is in the process of preparing its first submission, which should be ready for 2011. With the University of Ottawa’s impressive track record on sustainability issues, hopes are the institution will place somewhere in the top tier of reporting institutions.

The founding members of the STARS program, known also as charter members, are making a collective statement about the importance of sustainability. It is hoped that the combined prestige of these institutions and their commitment to sustainability will elevate its importance among postsecondary institutions. In fact, the 230 STARS founding members represent the cream of the crop as far as academic institutions go. The list of these members reads like a "who's who" in the sustainability game. The University of Colorado at Boulder; Berkeley, Columbia University, Duke University, Penn State and Yale are just a few of the names on the list.

There are only nine Canadian institutions participating in the STARS program, but these schools are a powerhouse of sustainability-minded institutions and include Dalhousie University, McGill University, Royal Roads University, Simon Fraser University, University of Alberta, University of British Columbia, University of Saskatchewan, University of Western Ontario and the University of Ottawa. Together these institutions are pushing forward the sustainability agenda in Canada.