by Brianna Crandall — October 31, 2014—The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) recently released its 2014 STARS Annual Review, a publication that highlights sustainability innovations and best practices from colleges and universities worldwide.
The publication features 105 higher education institutions that earned a STARS rating this year from AASHE’s Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System (STARS)—a transparent, self-reporting framework for colleges and universities to measure their sustainability performance. The institutions are located in the United States, Canada, Ecuador, Japan, the Netherlands and Switzerland. To date, over 325 colleges and universities have earned a STARS rating, and over 650 institutions are participating in STARS.
“AASHE is excited to celebrate campus sustainability achievements and STARS ratings through the release of this publication”, said AASHE Executive Director Stephanie A. Herrera. “I’m grateful for the effort and dedication of the entire STARS community toward sustainability, as well as the AASHE staff who created this annual review. STARS is raising the bar for campus sustainability performance and, with feedback collected from our community, we will continue to improve the integrity and rigor of this critical program.”
Some notable trends identified in this year’s publication include more reports submitted from Associate and Baccalaureate colleges as compared to previous years, and an increase in average scores within subsequent STARS reports. A Tableau infographic accompanies the publication, allowing individuals to view the innovations and best practices referenced in the review through a dynamic map display, with filtering options for institutional characteristics.
