SUSTAINABILITY

Creation Care is rooted in who we are and what we do.

We want renewing God’s good earth to be a way of life, so we make sustainability a priority—as an educational goal and an institutional value. We’re committed to learning how to be good caretakers of creation on our campus and around the globe.

Sustainability efforts at Calvin are rooted both in our heritage and our reformed mission. They are also strategic. The current strategic plan embraces and enacts environmental sustainability as a core value. And Calvin is guided in its sustainability efforts by its board of trustees-approved Statement on Sustainability, which takes seriously the biblical mandate to be stewards of God’s good earth.

KEY FACTS

Stars logo

AASHE Stars Silver recipient

Climate Commitment logo

Signatory of Presidents’ Climate Commitment

Tree campus logo

Honored Tree Campus USA recipient

Plaster Creek Stewards logo

$2.8 million in external grants for Plaster Creek Stewards

“Sustainability emerges from choices that, on balance, promote economic vitality, social equity, and a flourishing natural environment both now and for generations to come.”
- Calvin Energy and Environmental Sustainability Committee, 2019

Initiatives

STUDENT LIFE

CALVIN AS LIVING LABORATORY

EXPERIENTIAL CLASSES

COMMUNITY SERVICE

We’ve pledged to go carbon-neutral

On Thursday, December 7, 2017, Calvin University President Michael K. Le Roy signed Second Nature’s President’s Climate Commitment. The signing took place during the Calvin Environmental Assessment Program’s (CEAP) Poster Session in the Calvin University Chapel. With the signing, the Calvin community is pledging to take steps to make the campus carbon neutral by 2057.

President’s Climate Commitment

Sustainability Taskforce Recommendations

A Brief History

  • 2020 Silver STARS rating achieved.
  • 2019 Beyond Stewardship, a book edited by David Paul Warners and Matthew Kuperus Heun, is published with the goal of equipping Christians to live better in this world and think more intentionally about our relationship with the creation around us.
  • 2019 Silver STARS rating achieved.
  • 2017 President signed the Climate Commitment.
  • 2017 Calvin earned Silver STARS rating for second year in a row.
  • 2016 Calvin receives a STARS Silver Rating for sustainability achievements from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE).
  • 2014 A second community garden is established on the Knollcrest campus.
  • 2011 An environmental studies major is established.
  • 2010 Calvin receives the “Greatest Green Initiative” award from the Business Review in West Michigan for innovation in faculty development and sustainability across the curriculum, among other initiatives.
  • 2009 Plaster Creek Stewards, a collaboration of faculty, staff, and students working with local schools, churches, and community partners to restore the health and beauty to the area’s most contaminated waterway, is formed.
  • 2008 Engineering students launch CERF, a green revolving fund, with donations and seed money from the university.
  • 2007 The board of trustees approves the Statement on Sustainability, a document produced by the Faculty Environmental Stewardship Coalition.
  • 2004 The Bunker Interpretive Center is completed. The 5,000-square-foot educational space is the first LEED Gold-certified building in Grand Rapids.
  • 1997 The Calvin Environmental Assessment Program is started, taking academically based service-learning to another level.
  • 1990 The student-led Environmental Stewardship Coalition is established with the mission of raising campus consciousness regarding current environmental issues and emphasizing the Christian responsibility of stewardship.
  • 1985 The Calvin Ecosystem Preserve & Native Gardens is established, and in 2017, expands to comprise 1/4 of the campus.
  • 1980 Earthkeeping: Christian Stewardship of Natural Resources, a groundbreaking book on creation care, is published.
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