Overall Rating Gold
Overall Score 69.27
Liaison Mark Klapatch-Mathias
Submission Date Feb. 29, 2024

STARS v2.2

University of Wisconsin-River Falls
EN-6: Assessing Sustainability Culture

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.00 / 1.00 Mark Klapatch-Mathias
Sustainability Coordinator
Office of Sustainability
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Does the institution conduct an assessment of sustainability culture?:
Yes

Which of the following best describes the cultural assessment? The assessment is administered to::
The entire campus community (students and employees) directly or by representative sample

Which of the following best describes the structure of the cultural assessment? The assessment is administered::
Longitudinally to measure change over time

A brief description of how and when the cultural assessment(s) were developed and/or adopted:
UWRF conducted a sustainability culture survey in April 2019 with a follow up assessment in 2022.

A copy or sample of the questions related to sustainability culture:
A sample of the questions related to sustainability culture or the website URL where the assessment tool is available:
See attached file.

A brief description of how representative samples were reached (if applicable) and how the cultural assessment is administered:
The survey was directly emailed out to all students and employees.

A brief summary of results from the cultural assessment:
See attached file for an executive summary of the report.

Here are the top 5 takeaways from the comparison of the 2022 report to the 2019 report:
1. Interest in using campus as a living laboratory to enhance sustainability education increased by 7.2% in 2022 and is the highest priority action related to academics. The 2019 report reflected that the highest priority at that time was increasing number of departments that offer sustainability-inclusive courses.
2. The 2022 results shows more campus support (student and employee) for funding sustainability initiatives and staffing. This is reflected in sustainability being added as a core value and being included in both the academic and strategic plans.
3. Comparison between the 2019 and 2022 report show that there is still not a good understanding of our greenhouse gas emissions and the associated impacts. This continues to be an area where more education is needed. 55% of survey respondents in 2022 list energy as their #1 priority.
4. Implementing an organics collection system on campus continues to be desired by the campus community with 77.4% of survey respondents prioritizing this in the 2022 report compared to 71.6% in the 2019 report.
5. Open comments in the 2022 report are similar to the 2019 report, however, they definitely reflect a desire for more sustainable action on campus.

Optional Fields 

Website URL where information about the assessment of sustainability culture is available:
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Additional documentation to support the submission:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
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