Overall Rating Silver - expired
Overall Score 61.34
Liaison Jennifer Kleindienst
Submission Date Dec. 20, 2019

STARS v2.2

Wesleyan University
PA-9: Committee on Investor Responsibility

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.50 / 2.00 Sanya Bery
Student Chair
Committee on Investor Responsibility
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Does the institution have a formally established and active committee on investor responsibility (CIR) or equivalent body?:
Yes

The charter or mission statement of the CIR or other body which reflects social and environmental concerns or a brief description of how the CIR is tasked to address social and environmental concerns:
Charter: http://cir.wsa.wesleyan.edu/page-2/
"The Committee for Investor Responsibility shall:
1. Consider issues of ethical, moral, and social responsibility in the investment policies of Wesleyan University"

Does the CIR include academic staff representation?:
No

Does the CIR include non-academic staff representation?:
Yes

Does the CIR include student representation?:
Yes

Members of the CIR, including affiliations and role:
The CIR currently has six student members (Sanya Bery '21 (Student Chair), Shirmai Chung '22, Natalie Selfe '22, Scott McMahon '22, Huiqin Hu '21, and Alesandro Lorenzoni '21) and three staff members (Valerie Nye - Finance and Brett Salafia and Jonathan Farrar - Investments). The CIR has historically included faculty members, but none are currently on CIR.

None
Examples of CIR actions during the previous three years:
The central focus of the CIR for the past several years has been advocacy surrounding how Wesleyan chooses the external managers who invest the vast majority of the University’s endowment. The CIR is currently working to develop a quantitative index for measuring managers’ environmental and social responsibility, in order to aid the Trustees in selecting high-road investment vehicles.

In 2018-2019, the CIR worked with the Wesleyan Student Assembly on a resolution pledging to divest its endowment from Wesleyan's endowment, as well as the Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund Admiral Shares (Vanguard Fund), as a commitment to divest from the Israeli occupation of Palestine and fossil fuels.

In 2019, the CIR contributed an article advocating for Wesleyan to transfer its investments out of the fossil fuels industry. The CIR will continue these efforts by working with student groups on campus in the 2019-2020 school year.

Information on other past projects and actions of CIR is at http://www.wesleyanstudentassembly.org/projects.

Optional Fields 

Website URL where information about the institution’s committee on investor responsibility is available:
Additional documentation to support the submission:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
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