UAA has big, green plans for final push in sustainability competition

Students, faculty and staff have eyes on the prize

Last fall "sibling" rivals UAA and UAF announced plans to compete in the first UAA/UAF Sustainability Cup Challenge, an environmentally-friendly version of the annual intrastate hockey rivalry. This spring UAA kicks the competition into high gear with activities geared at reducing its impact on the earth and raising its sustainability grade.

UAA's spring activities include:

Alternative Transportation Week, April 5-9: Students, faculty and staff will be encouraged to use alternative transportation to get to campus this week. Follow students, faculty and staff as they ride the bus, their bikes and take their feet to the street to get to UAA.


Sustainability Pledge, March 22- April 30: Students, faculty and staff can sign a pledge to live a more sustainability-conscious life by committing to reduce the resources they use and get cool UAA gear! Pledge by visiting the Sustainability Web site.


Duplex Day, April 14: Spirit the Seawolf will visit campus office copy and printing rooms to make sure departments are using "duplex mode" when copying and printing.


Dorm Electricity Challenge, March 15-April 15: UAA dorms will compete against one another to see which building can reduce their electricity use the most during this time period.


Furniture/Clothes Recycle Week, FINALS WEEK, April 26-30: Students can recycle their used clothing and other still-valuable stuff instead of throwing things in the dumpster.
 The Northern Light advertising campaign, March 29-April 30: Fun, quirky educational advertising campaign on sustainability issues.

What spurred the green competition between the two universities were the latest Sustainability Report Card results, published by the Sustainable Endowments Institute. Each year the Sustainable Endowments Institute assesses 300 public and private colleges and universities with the largest endowments and publishes the results. The 2010 grade for UAA was a B- and UAF received a grade of a C-.

The school with the highest report card grade will house the trophy of the losing school during the 2010-11 academic year. The next set of scores will be released in October 2010. The competition includes having the chancellor of the losing school deliver the trophy (Sustainability Cup) to the chancellor of the winning school and preparing a "sustainable" meal for the chancellor of the winning school using locally grown products.

For additional information on the challenge, please call Scott McCrae at UAF (907) 474-7905, or Kristin DeSmith at UAA (907) 786-1263.