As fall term comes to a close, it is time to reflect on where we’ve been and what we’ve accomplished with the Climate Action Plan! We record our progress in fiscal years (FY): the 12 month period between every June and the next July, which the College uses to track accounting, budgeting, and planning. Sustainability can sometimes be a tricky subject to mark one’s progress on – whether it’s small projects that no one sees, or action steps that take years to come to fruition, climate action can be hard to track! At K, however, climate action is happening all the time, all across campus. Here are some of the progressive steps we made in FY24 (July 2023-June 2024) to fulfill the goals of the College’s Climate Action Plan!

GREENHOUSE GAS GOAL

During FY24, much of our progress on the Greenhouse Gas Goal comes from the ongoing sustainability projects around campus. One of the most impactful projects currently in the works affects the Light Fine Arts Building, DeWaters Residence Hall, and Olds Upton Lecture Hall. These three buildings are all in transition from central steam to regional heating, which will allow the heating for buildings to occur within or much closer to the individual buildings themselves!

Continuing on the trend of localizing our energy infrastructure, we are working towards accomplishing our building level energy metering goal. kWh (kilowatt hour) meters for all buildings serviced by campus electricity are in place to be set up by 2025; the Markin Racquet Center has been switched to all-new LED lights; and the College has officially joined the Kalamazoo Energy Collaborative.

Learn more about the Greenhouse Gas Goal here.

RESOURCE CONSERVATION GOAL

One of the biggest action items the CAP Committee accomplished during FY23 was to eliminate the non-scientific use of helium. Helium is a very limited natural resource, and by strictly limiting our campus consumption, we are making strides towards resource conservation. In FY24, that policy has been in place and enforced for the first time!

Another piece of ongoing progress is campus waste stream management – in other words, having a sustainable and efficient system to process trash, recycling, and compost all across campus. An on-campus summer fellowship was created to help reconfigure campus waste stream management.

We have also continued to work with Parkhurst Dining Services to ensure the presence of compostable disposables for all dining-related disposables. This happens in partnership with My Green Michigan, and is a great example of collaborative work between the campus and Michigan community.

Learn more about the Resource Conservation Goal here.

LEARNING GOAL

With the goal of exposing every K student to climate literacy, there’s a lot of important work involved with the Learning Goal! For one, the Biology Department has launched a re-design of it’s course trajectory, including new courses with an emphasis on climate biology.

The Environmental Stewardship Center has also utilized a comprehensive internship training session prior to the start of fall term. This training includes students working with the ESC in the following positions: Composting Crew, Hoop House Interns, Arb Trail Crew, ESC Interns.

The Faculty Representatives of the Climate Action Plan Committee have also begun the creation of a faculty climate toolkit, designed to inform and encourage K College faculty to teach climate-related material within their existing courses.

Learn more about the Learning Goal here.

ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSIBILITY GOAL

One of the most exciting pieces of progress made in the Environmental Responsibility Goal was the approval of a Fossil Fuels Divestment Dashboard. Requested by the ECO student organization and put together by the Business & Finance unit, this dashboard represents increased transparency and solidarity in the reduction of fossil fuel use on campus.

The Environmental Stewardship Center hired an ESC Coordinator – Greta Farley, K’22. The ESC also had Hoop House interns attend and participate in the 2024 Foodways Symposium at the Kalamazoo Valley Food Innovation Center.

Learn more about the Environmental Responsibility Goal here.

The City of Kalamazoo has exciting news to announce: as of last month, Kalamazoo has officially kicked off its next ten year master plan: Imagine Kalamazoo 2035! What is a master plan? A city’s master plan is a broad outlook on the area’s future – it’s a set of goals, values, dreams, and plans to help that city create a better life for all its citizens. Imagine Kalamazoo 2035 is a plan for the next decade in Kalamazoo. It’s the process of “imagining a vision for Kalamazoo’s future – discussing it, planning it, designing it, and acting on it” (City of Kalamazoo, 2024).

Imagine Kalamazoo 2035, or IK2035, is all about engaging with the greater Kalamazoo community. There are tons of new and ongoing projects that help make this engagement possible! They include a city-wide book read, surveys, and meetings. All of these engagement efforts will help inform the creation of a new master plan, as well as the City’s Strategic Vision (the overarching guiding document for the City informed by the community’s priorities and vision for the future of Kalamazoo).

Kalamazoo College is an important voice in the IK2035 discussion. Students, faculty, and staff at K College engage with the City and greater Kalamazoo on so many levels – civic engagement programs, simple trips downtown, class trips off campus, and students living in nearby neighborhoods, just to name a few examples. Because our campus is so tightly woven into the Kalamazoo community, our voices and vision are essential for making IK2035 as great as it can be.

As IK2035 kicks off, now is the perfect time for K College folks to give input and shape the plan! There are so many ways to do this, and it can be hard to figure out where to go. With this in mind, we invite you to come to a special event. Next Thursday, October 24th from 4-5pm, join us in the Arcus Center to talk about Imagine Kalamazoo 2035! Come learn about IK 2035 as a whole, and how we as strategic partners can contribute. Your voice is important, and we hope to see you there!

An integral part of our Climate Action Plan is our awareness of, and our commitment to, responsible and sustainable use of fossil fuels. Although it is a long, complicated process, Kalamazoo College aims to decrease our reliance on fossil fuels, and to power our college through local and renewable sources.

One major step forward we’ve recently taken towards sustainability is the creation of our Fossil Fuels Endowment Dashboard! Found on the Sustainability at K website, the Dashboard is a tool to help those in the K Community make sense and keep track of where the College’s investment money is going. The Dashboard is a step forward in our Climate Action Plan’s (CAP) Environmental Responsibility Goal: to develop campus-wide efforts to educate the K College community about climate change, stretching beyond courses and academic programs. One part of that Goal is to increase sustainable investing practices – together with the Socially Responsible Investment Advisory Committee (SRIAC), the ESC and CAP committee are thrilled to have the Dashboard available to the public.

When you visit the Dashboard, you can learn about the College’s exposure to fossil fuel producers. You can also get a better understanding of how K measures up to certain climate risk indicators, and see how the K endowment is put to use with sustainable investing practices. Check it out!

Did you know that Kalamazoo College has a Climate Action Plan (CAP)? The CAP plays an integral role in K’s journey towards sustainability. With our current CAP stretching for the next five years, let’s explore what the CAP brings to our community.

What is a Climate Action Plan?

As climate change becomes an increasingly prevalent force in our lives, a successful climate action plan can guide how communities respond. They provide a framework for recording and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, as well as for leading an environmentally responsible life.

The Kalamazoo College Climate Action Plan (CAP) has an overarching goal of carbon neutrality. More than that, the plan ensures that our core value of sustainability is interwoven with all aspects of campus life.

Our CAP Goals

K’s Climate Action Plan is broken down into four smaller goals, all of which combine to help achieve carbon neutrality by 2050:

• Greenhouse Gas Goal: Reduce GHG emissions by 35% of 2008 levels by fiscal year end 2028.
• Resource Conservation Goal: Provide leadership in Resources Conservation measures for campus operations. 
• Learning Goal: Work toward exposing every Kalamazoo College student to the study of issues related to climate/climate change, ensuring that Kalamazoo College graduates will possess climate literacy.
• Environmental Responsibility Goal: Develop campus-wide efforts to educate the K College community about climate change —stretching beyond courses and academic programs. 

Stay Up to Date

Want to know more about the Climate Action Plan? Check out these resources below.

From all of us at the Environmental Stewardship Center, welcome back to another year at K! And for our first-years, we’re so excited to have you on campus. We’re also excited to share with you some of the awesome events, ongoing projects, and other environmental opportunities that the ESC is involved with this fall. Below, you can explore what’s going on, and how to get involved with us!

The Environmental Stewardship Center (ESC)

The Larry J. Bell ’80 Environmental Stewardship Center, or ESC, is the hub for all things sustainability at Kalamazoo College. The ESC works with our Climate Action Plan & Committee, the Hoop House, the Composting program, and the Lillian Anderson Arboretum! The Center exists to help infuse themes of sustainability in all parts of life at K College, and to create more chances to get students, faculty, and staff involved in environmental work.

You can visit the Environmental Stewardship Center on the first floor of Dewing, just off the Dewing Commons! Stop by and chat with our directors and interns any time, or join our bi-weekly community lunches (on Wednesdays of even weeks). For more information, check out the ESC website, or send us an email at environmentalstewardship@kzoo.edu!

The Hoop House

Come visit one of our campus green spaces: the lovely Hoop House gardens! Here, you can learn about tending for all kinds of plants, eat delicious and nutritious food, and join a community of people who care deeply for the health of the Earth. All kinds of classes and clubs utilize the Hoop House space, and we’re always looking for more.

The Hoop House has open gardening hours from 4:30-6pm every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday! Stop by to get your hands in the dirt, harvest some fruits or veggies, or simply study or hang out! The Hoop House is located at the bottom of Academy Street behind the Fitness and Wellness Center.

Composting

One of the most important processes that makes our campus thrive is our community composting! Run by students with the support of Facilities Management and the ESC, the Compost Crew helps students, faculty, and staff turn their waste into rich and healthy soil (which then helps feed all of our green spaces and gardens)! Last year alone, the Crew helped compost nearly 7000lbs of food waste!

Composting takes place in The Grove, a forested space between the Living Learning Houses and DeWaters residence hall. You can participate by picking up one of the green composting buckets, adding your food scraps and returning the bucket to The Grove, or by taking the composting PE class! Faculty and staff offices can also participate with campus rounds. Check out the composting website to learn more.

The Lillian Anderson Arboretum

A true highlight of green life at K is a trip to the Lillian Anderson Arboretum. Located 5 miles away from campus, this 140 acre space is home to forests, marshes, prairies, and meadows. Students and faculty use the space as a learning laboratory for classes and research, and the trails are also open to be enjoyed by members of the public.

A student Arb Crew is responsible for managing this lovely land and its trails! Transportation is provided for this work. To learn more about the Arb and Arb Crew, check out its website.

Share with us!

Thanks for reading! This blog will continue to update weekly, and showcase all kinds of environmentally-focused happenings around K We’d love to hear from you! If you have ideas for blog posts, projects you want to share, or progress you see being made, please let us know via this form! The ESC exists to unite our community around a shared vision for a sustainable future – we can’t do it without you! So, keeping sharing with us, and stay tuned for more to come. Happy Fall, Hornets!

Steps Towards a Sustainable K

As the academic year comes to a close, it’s time again to reflect on where we’ve been and what we’ve accomplished. Sustainability can sometimes be a tricky subject to mark one’s progress on – whether it’s small projects that no one sees, or action steps that take years to come to fruition, climate action can be hard to track! At K, however, climate action is happening all the time, all across campus. Here are some of the progressive steps we’ve made this year in working to fulfill the goals of the College’s Climate Action Plan!

GREENHOUSE GAS GOAL

One of the first goals of the current Climate Action Plan is to transition campus from central steam to regional/local water heat. This would allow the heating for buildings to occur within or much closer to the individual buildings themselves. We already have three projects in progress, with the Light Fine Arts building, Olds Upton, and DeWaters dormitory all scheduled to be finished by the end of 2024.

We’ve also made progress on retro-commissioning campus buildings, with Dewing Hall being completed in summer 2023, as well as a controls upgrade for Mandelle.

In addition, we’re paying close attention to the energy that each of our buildings uses, in line with the building level energy metering goal. kWh (kilowatt hour) meters for all buildings serviced by campus electricity are in place to be set up by 2025; the Markin Racquet Center has been switched to all-new LED lights; and the College has officially joined the Kalamazoo Energy Collaborative.

RESOURCE CONSERVATION GOAL

One of the biggest action items the CAP Committee accomplished this year was to eliminate the non-scientific use of helium. Helium is a very limited natural resource, and by strictly limiting our campus consumption, we are making strides towards resource conservation.

Another piece of ongoing progress is in regards to campus waste stream management – in other words, having a sustainable and efficient system to process trash, recycling, and compost all across campus. Senior Camran Stack K’24 completed a summer project researching the litter on campus, and has helped shape a plan to provide new sorting receptacles in the coming years.

You also might have noticed a lot of construction going on around Olds Upton – this was to reduce stormwater runoff! Helping in the face of coming years with heavier and more frequent precipitation, OU now has a new system for stormwater detention and routing.

LEARNING GOAL

In order to work toward exposing every Kalamazoo College student to the study of issues related to climate/climate change, we’ve updated the course catalog to include a list of courses that raise climate literacy. We’ve also begun creating a preliminary faculty toolkit, which professors can use to enhance their courses with climate change-related material.

We’re also enhancing student opportunities for experiential education focused on climate change. This year, we re-designed the position of Hoop House intern, and welcomed 4 student interns who help cultivate one of the most important green spaces on campus. Their orientation took place right alongside other environmentally-related interns from the Environmental Stewardship Center and Composting Crew.

ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSIBILITY GOAL

This year, we launched an orientation module for first year and transfer students to initiate campus engagement with sustainability and climate resiliency. It was a major success, with dozens of students showing up to learn about campus climate action! We plan to continue incorporating this module in the years to come. 

We’ve also tried to increase our intersectional climate action, by creating ways for our community members and partners to engage with us. We’ve created a form with which students, faculty, and staff can share their climate-related work with the CAP Committee; we’ve also increased our partnership with the City of Kalamazoo, attending Fridays for Future meetings and holding joint events like the Kalamazoo Climate Rally.

In Conclusion…

A lot of progress has been made this year – and we still have a long way to go. We’re proud of all the student, faculty, and staff voices that have contributed to all this meaningful climate action work on campus, and to all the voices we have yet to hear. Working towards sustainability is a long, uphill road, it’s true. It’s also an incredible, connective, and uplifting space – one that will continue to have a presence at Kalamazoo College for years to come.

On Wednesday, May 29th, Kalamazoo College is hosting the 2nd-annual “A Better Way to K!” A Better Way to K is a day in which we encourage all students, faculty, and staff to find transportation to K that does not include a car.

This “no-drive” day hopes to have a large impact on our campus! For one, it decreases our campus’s overall carbon emissions, moving us one step closer to becoming carbon neutral. It also promotes a healthy lifestyle of walking, running, and biking. Most importantly, finding A Better Way to K – not just alternative transportation, but a better way to live and and experience Kalamazoo College – shows that a sustainable lifestyle is not only possible, but valued and encouraged in our community!

To learn more about the day, hear from the community about why they may or may not be participating, and to share your experience with us, please check out “A Better Way to K’s” official website here.

As May brings all kinds of blooms and sunshine to campus, there’s no better time to look back on everything environmental that happened on campus during April, aka Earth Month!

At the beginning of the month, students, faculty, and staff participated in Worldwide Climate Justice and Education Week. With teach-ins and events happening every day of the first week of April, it was great to see so many members of our campus community engaging in climate action efforts!

A big theme of Earth Month was community – how can we build and celebrate community around the central ideas of sustainability and environmental activism? One way was by having an open Climate Action Plan meeting, where all of campus was invited to come hear about our progress on its goals, ask questions, and give ideas for direction in upcoming terms! Another community event was Rot Your Troubles (cathartic composting in the Grove), an awesome collaboration between the composting program and SPEAK.

We also joined together with the greater Kalamazoo community to celebrate Earth month! K students, faculty, and staff teamed up with their counterparts from Western Michigan University for a climate rally – they marched from their respective campuses, joined up on Academy Street, and headed towards Bronson Park for an afternoon of demonstration, speeches, and action. Additionally, interns from the Hoop House attended the Food Ways Symposium at KVCC! They shared good food and knowledge about the African diaspora garden that thrived in the Hoop House last growing season.

As the month drew to a close, it was time for the annual Sustainability SIP Symposium, a showcase of senior projects from all disciplines across campus that dealt with themes of environmental studies, sustainability, and the human-nature relationship. This year, we had a diverse range of projects including grazing sheep in the Arboretum, tackling the ins and outs of ecotourism in Costa Rica, and analyzing German environmental political propoganda.

Thank you to everyone in our campus community who helped make this Earth Month so special. We’ve loved seeing the passion and dedication of environmentally-minded folks, and it’s been truly uplifting to spend time making meaningful climate action together. We hope that these efforts can continue on long past the end of Earth Month, and that our journey towards sustainability can stretch far into the future!

This week, environmentally-minded folks at Kalamazoo College had two things to celebrate: Earth Week, and the 2024 Sustainability SIP Symposium!

Hosted by the Environmental Stewardship Center and the Environmental Studies Department, the Symposium is a gathering of seniors who completed their Senior Integrated Project (SIP) in Environmental Studies; their projects came from disciplines all across campus, from biology, to German, to art!

Students, families, and friends came together in the Banquet Hall to hear the seniors present on their topics, answer questions, and explore the work of their peers. This year’s SIPs covered a diverse range of topics, including grazing sheep in the Arboretum, tackling the ins and outs of ecotourism in Costa Rica, and painting human-nature relations inspired by the Nature Center’s DeLano Farms.

The SIP Symposium is an important event because it invites all of our campus community to understand a key concept: that sustainability at Kalamazoo College is a collective effort! It doesn’t only come from the Environmental Stewardship Center, or the natural sciences; sustainability takes all of us, from all communities and areas of study.

A special thank you to our seniors, who created and shared such wonderful projects with us: Aide Hazel Gaitan, Guenevere Baierle, Camran Stack, Olivia DePauli, Quinn Collins, Celia A. Kuch, Aerin Braunohler, Gabriel Coleman.

We can’t wait to see you all at next year’s Symposium!