Overall Rating Silver - expired
Overall Score 56.61
Liaison Kelsey Beal
Submission Date Nov. 2, 2015
Executive Letter Download

STARS v2.0

Indiana University Bloomington
EN-3: Student Life

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 2.00 / 2.00 Kristin Brethova
Assistant Director of Sustainability
IU Office of Sustainability
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Does the institution have one or more co-curricular sustainability programs and initiatives that fall into the following categories?:
Yes or No
Active student groups focused on sustainability Yes
Gardens, farms, community supported agriculture (CSA) or fishery programs, or urban agriculture projects where students are able to gain experience in organic agriculture and sustainable food systems Yes
Student-run enterprises that include sustainability as part of their mission statements or stated purposes No
Sustainable investment funds, green revolving funds or sustainable microfinance initiatives through which students can develop socially, environmentally and fiscally responsible investment and financial skills Yes
Conferences, speaker series, symposia or similar events related to sustainability that have students as the intended audience Yes
Cultural arts events, installations or performances related to sustainability that have students as the intended audience Yes
Wilderness or outdoors programs that follow Leave No Trace principles Yes
Sustainability-related themes chosen for themed semesters, years, or first-year experiences Yes
Programs through which students can learn sustainable life skills Yes
Sustainability-focused student employment opportunities offered by the institution Yes
Graduation pledges through which students pledge to consider social and environmental responsibility in future job and other decisions No
Other co-curricular sustainability programs and initiatives ---

The name and a brief description of each student group focused on sustainability:

Alpha Phi Omega (APO)
Alpha Phi Omega is a National Service Fraternity -- college students gather together in an organization based on fraternalism and founded on the principles of Leadership, Friendship and Service. Its aim is to further the freedom that is our national, educational and intellectual heritage. APO, specifically the Mu Chapter at Indiana University Bloomington, is open to any IUB student who would like to join. Given that they do not have a house, members of social fraternities and sororities are welcome as well as anyone who lives in a residence hall or off-campus. APO has partnered with IU’s Volunteers in Sustainability (ViS) on various sustainability-oriented community service projects, including helping out with a trash audit that documented all of the trash put in dumpsters around campus that could actually be recycled (about 50%).
http://www.indiana.edu/~apo

Beekeeping Club
We began the Beekeeping Club at IU to address the widespread decline in Honeybee populations known as Colony Collapse Disorder. Honeybees are essential to producing much of the world’s food, but they’re dying in masses largely due to harmful pesticides and minimal biodiversity used in commercial farms, climate change, and other factors. Saving the Honeybees will require systematic changes in the ways we produce, purchase, and dispose of our food.
https://beinvolved.indiana.edu/organization/BeesIU

Collins E-force
E-Force is the student environmentalism group within Collins Living Learning Center. Membership is open to all residents of Collins Living-Learning Center.
https://sites.google.com/site/collinsstudentgovernment/student-organizations/e-force

Culture of Care
Culture of Care is a campus wide, student-led and staff-supported initiative focused on creating a campus culture in which members of the Indiana University Bloomington community demonstrate “care” for one another. Through bystander intervention, the Culture of Care initiative empowers students to support their peers. The Culture of Care initiative promotes helping one another, behavioral change, and raising awareness in four core areas: sexual well-being, mental health, alcohol & drug awareness, and respect.
https://beinvolved.indiana.edu/organization/CultureOfCare/about

Diversity in Action
Diversity in Action (DIA) was founded in 2010 by Giavanna Galloway, a Hudson and Holland and Herbert Presidential Scholar and member of the Hutton Honors College (HHC). The group was created to serve the HHC, Indiana University, and greater Bloomington, Indiana communities. DIA functions to promote diversity education and awareness, celebrate cultural differences between groups, and promote unity among students of different backgrounds in order to create a more representative, inclusive, and cohesive atmosphere within the areas that it serves.
http://www.indiana.edu/~iubhonor/students/diversityinaction.php

Ducks Unlimited IU Chapter
This club is the IU chapter of Ducks Unlimited; an organization dedicated to the conservation, restoration, and management of wetlands and associated habitats for North America's waterfowl.
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Ducks-Unlimited-at-Indiana-University/144811165564950?sk=info

Emergent Theatre
The purpose of this organization is to provide a safe place and space for students to convene and engage in civil dialogue that galvanizes positive responses to social injustice in local, national, and global communities. The organization will host community workshops, create theatre productions, as well as partner with various diversity and inclusion campus initiatives. This group will not function as a combative organization. The purpose is to specifically promote peace, unity, and camaraderie across social barriers.
https://beinvolved.indiana.edu/organization/EmergentTheatre/about

Environmental Law Society (ELS)
The specific goals of ELS are to promote the organization, local community awareness and education concerning the environment; to provide an interface between the student body and the legal community, to represent the student body’s interest in environmental law within the law school community, throughout the State of Indiana, and in cooperation with other schools and environmental groups. The ELS seeks to provide a forum for critique and/or support of the legal system, current laws and regulations, and actions undertaken by other groups that concern the environment.
http://www.law.indiana.edu/students/activities/environmental

Environmental Management and Sustainable Development Association
The Environmental Management and Sustainable Development Association (EMSDA) is a professional student organization through the School of Public and Environmental Affairs. It has been established to provide a forum for exchange of ideas and information, enhance students career preparation through interaction with professionals and establish a network for potential positions and/or internships related to environmental management or sustainable development. In addition, we promote environmental and sustainability education, and support awareness of issues and ideas that affect people and the environment.
http://www.indiana.edu/~iuemsda/

Global Brigades at IU
Global Business Brigades at Indiana University strives to create a level of sustainability in third world countries, in particular, Panama. They do this by consulting microenterprises on week-long trips to rural areas of Panama. Students are able to learn about the Panamanian culture while teaching community members basic knowledge of business concepts learned here at Indiana University.
http://iugbb.weebly.com/

Graduate Professional Student Goverment (GPSG)
The fundamental mission of the Indiana University Graduate and Professional Student Government (GPSG) is to serve and advocate for the interests of graduate and professional students on the Bloomington campus. Having gained formal recognition as the government of the graduate and professional students at IUB, the GPSG functions as a united voice to express the concerns of this population to the administration, student body, and Bloomington community.
http://www.indiana.edu/~gpso/

Greeks Go Green (GGG)
The purpose of the organization, Greeks Go Green, is to provide awareness and facilitate the move to a more environmentally friendly Greek community. Greeks Go Green will distribute information to the Greek community on ways to become more sustainable, as well as assist in getting all Greek houses recycling programs. Above all, Greeks Go Green wants to set an example for the campus as a whole.

Indiana Public Interest Research Group (INPIRG)
Throughout the 1970s, and now since 1997, students who have been involved with their INPIRG campus chapter have not only learned how to investigate a problem and come up with a practical solution. We've also learned how to convince the media and decision-makers to pay attention and take action. In other words, through INPIRG we gain an educational experience in democratic citizenship. In addition, we get a chance to face up to society's big problems, take action, and win concrete changes that improve the quality of our lives.
http://inpirg.org/iu

IU Student Association (IUSA)
The IU Student Association is a congregation of Indiana University students that work to protect student rights, enrich student life, and improve Indiana University. Students join together to voice common concerns, hopes, grievances, and most importantly, to take action to realize an even stronger University.
http://iusa.indiana.edu/

IU Student Foundation (IUSF)
The mission of the IU Student Foundation is to create student leadership opportunities by conducting campus events that raise funding for working student scholarships; as well as guide the undergraduate student toward recognition and appreciation of his or her future role as a meaningful, supportive Indiana University alumnus.
http://www.iusf.indiana.edu/

IU Caving Club
The IU caving club is a organization of loosely affiliated cavers and cave enthusiasts. We lead monthly trips (sometimes several, they are free except for the cost of membership), organize cleanups, maintain ongoing mapping projects, and just do a lot of cave related things.
http://www.indiana.edu/~iusc/index.html

Net Impact Sustainable Business Club Graduate Chapter
Net Impact fosters Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) within businesses by reaching out to future business leaders, namely MBA students and graduates. The Net Impact chapter at Kelley continues to grow and was recently recognized by national headquarters at the 2010 National Net Impact Conference for having the largest increase in conference attendance. Originally created in 2008, the Kelley Chapter continues to progress from previous developments such as CSR curriculum integration, CSR career resources and development, and an ever-expanding national network of passionate young students and professionals. Our goal is to educate, equip, and inspire Kelley students and faculty to leverage business as a tool for social impact in Bloomington and beyond.
http://kelley.iu.edu/NetImpact/index.html

Net Impact Sustainable Business Club Undergraduate Chapter
he undergraduate Net Impact chapter at Kelley strives to educate Indiana University students about sustainable careers and enterprises as well as provide opportunities and connections in the industry. Net Impact is a new generation of leaders who use our careers to tackle the world’s toughest problems. Members put business skills to work for good throughout every sector, and by doing so, they hope to show that it’s possible to make a net impact that benefits not just the bottom line, but people and planet too.
http://kelley.iu.edu/netImpactundergrad/

Oxfam Club at Indiana University
OC at IU is a self-managed organization that is affiliated with Oxfam America. In alignment with Oxfam America's mission and current campaigns, OC at IU aims to construct and carry out projects and initiatives focused on alleviating poverty, hunger, and social injustice on both the international and local levels.
https://beinvolved.indiana.edu/organization/OCIU/about

Reinvest IU
Calling for IU Foundation to divest from fossil fuel companies, and for IU as a whole to take action for our environmental, financial, and moral standing.
https://www.facebook.com/reinvestIU/

Residence Halls Association (RHA)
Indiana's Residence Halls Association is committed to developing and maintaining a safe, respectful and productive student environment, and to empowering this community of students and protect its interests while contributing to the greater community of IU and beyond. To do this, RHA provides leadership opportunities, programs and social interaction in an academic environment, is an active channel of communication that creates proactive solutions while effectively representing our residents to the university, and exposes the student community to diverse, new ideas and experiences in order to improve and preserve residents’ quality of life. This includes environmentalist and sustainability-themed goals and initiatives.
https://sites.google.com/site/iurhawebsite/

Revitalizing Animal Well-Being (RAW)
RAW is the first successful animal advocacy group on the IU Bloomington campus. RAW has worked with various organizations, RPS, and other student groups to bring about better lives for animals.
http://www.indiana.edu/~iuraw/

Social Enterprise Engagement at Kelley (SEEK)
Social Enterprise Engagement at Kelley (SEEK) expands the boundaries of business by exploring the intersection between enterprise and social responsibility through empowering Kelley students to apply their professional and diverse skillsets.
https://beinvolved.indiana.edu/organization/SEEK

SPEA Undergraduate Student Association
SPEA USA was founded to improve the undergraduate experience at SPEA through discussions, professional events, networking, community service and social outings. Participating in SPEA USA events and meetings is a great way to make new friends, meet faculty and network with professionals in your career field.
http://www.indiana.edu/~speausa/index.htm

SPROUTS
SPROUTS' mission is to bring IU students and other Bloomington residents together to learn about the process of organic food production. Whether your dream is to grow modest amounts of non-toxic food for your own table, or larger amounts for local, regional, or national distribution, our sustainable student organization will help you achieve it. In this way, we are the change we wish to see and, we cultivate the land to cultivate ourselves and each other.
Contact: SPROUTS@indiana.edu

Student Sustainability Council
The Student Sustainability Council (SSC) oversees the management of the IU Sustainability Fund, an optional student fee by which students may donate $5 while registering for classes. Individuals and student organizations, regardless of association with the SSC, are encouraged to submit proposals to use the funding for sustainability-advancing projects on campus.
http://www.indiana.edu/~iubssc/sustainability_fund/index.php

Sierra Student Coalition (SSC)
The Sierra Student Coalition (SSC) is a broad network of high school and college-aged youth from across the country working to protect the environment. The SSC is the youth-led chapter of the Sierra Club, the nation's oldest and largest grassroots environmental organization. Our mission is simple: "to train, empower, and organize youth to run effective campaigns that result in tangible environmental victories and that develop leaders for the environmental movement." With more than 250 groups nationwide, the SSC develops environmental leaders through our award-winning grassroots trainings programs and works to maximize our campus-based effectiveness through the creation and maintenance of state and regional networks of high school and college students.
http://ssc.sierraclub.org/.

VegIU
The Vegan/Vegetarian Organization at Indiana University Bloomington is a social & support group for those interested in vegetarianism and veganism. We provide resources that help people live their life as a vegan or vegetarian. Every one of us has different reasons for pursuing a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle, including health-related, environmental, personal morals, and ethical principles. Beyond assuring our organization is informative, VegIU creates social opportunities for anyone interested in making friends and eating veg-friendly food.
http://www.indiana.edu/~vegiu/index.php


The website URL where information about student groups is available:
A brief description of gardens, farms, community supported agriculture (CSA) or fishery programs, and urban agriculture projects where students are able to gain experience in organic agriculture and sustainable food systems:

Students Producing Organics under the Sun (SPROUTS) is a collaborative student and community project focused on teaching environmental education and self-sufficiency through gardening, whose purpose is to sustainably produce food for student consumption and education. The overall mission of SPROUTS is to promote a holistic, sustainable environment on the IU campus and within the Bloomington community. We strive to: produce organic food; encourage local autonomy with food resources; cut back on the environmentally degrading and economically unsound process of shipping in food from outside the local community; invigorate waste and consumption reduction; implement composting of non-toxic, organic wastes on campus; educate the campus and local community about sustainable lifestyles, the interconnectedness of all of Life, and the wonder of the natural world; encourage hands-on learning outside of the classroom; promote community and trust without boundaries; create an environment conducive to health, knowledge, wisdom, prosperity, happiness, and compassion.


The website URL where information about the organic agriculture and/or sustainable food systems projects and initiatives is available:
A brief description of student-run enterprises that include sustainability as part of their mission statements or stated purposes:
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The website URL where information about the student-run enterprise(s) is available:
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A brief description of the sustainable investment or finance initiatives:

The Sustainability Fund is a student-driven and student-run fund created to facilitate positive, sustainable change on IU Bloomington’s campus. The projects aim to further the three pillars of sustainability: economic, social, and environmental, while creating a direct, measurable, and lasting impact on the students and the campus community.

Each semester when students register for classes, they have the option to check a box for the Sustainability Fund and donating $5.


The website URL where information about the sustainable investment or finance initiatives is available:
A brief description of conferences, speaker series, symposia or similar events related to sustainability that have students as the intended audience:

The Office of Sustainability at Indiana University Bloomington helps publicize sustainability related events available to the school and surrounding community through a weekly newsletter "This Week in Sustainability", and by listing the events on a calendar through their website. Such events include speakers, presentations, workshops, symposiums, and others.


The website URL where information about the event(s) is available:
A brief description of cultural arts events, installations or performances related to sustainability that have students as the intended audience:

Sustain IU week is full of a variety of programs highlighting sustainability, and is organized annually by the Student Sustainability Council.

The 2015 Sustain IU Week theme was "Water" and featured a keynote presentation by photographer and filmmaker, James Balog, as well as a screening of his film, Chasing Ice. Other invents included a panel discussion with artists engaging sustainability themes in their art, as well as a Hunger Banquet by Oxfam that highlighted food insecurity in the United States.

The 2016 Sustain IU Week theme will be "Diversity and Sustainability" and will also feature a wide variety of events.


The website URL where information about the cultural arts event(s) is available:
A brief description of wilderness or outdoors programs for students that follow Leave No Trace principles:

Indiana University Outdoor Adventures is an outdoor recreation program that serves the Bloomington campus and surrounding community. Outdoor Adventures gives people the opportunity to rent or buy quality camping and hiking gear, organize custom experiences, take skills courses for college credit, or sign up for adventure trips. It utilizes Leave No Trace principles on all of its trips, as well trains its leaders in their use.

Not only does Indiana University Outdoor Adventure (IUOA) follow No Trace Principles, their staff contains a few Leave No Trace Master Educators and Trainers as well. Leave No Trace is an integral part of their program, which is one of the reasons IUOA offers a one-credit class through the School of Public Health twice a year which sometimes offers students the opportunity to become Leave No Trace Trainers, the first level of training within the Leave No Trace curriculum.

As part of First Year Experience, IUOS also designed an early immersion experience in campus and community sustainability for incoming students as an option for students who wish to have an intensive orientation experience prior to Welcome Week.


The website URL where information about the wilderness or outdoors program(s) is available:
A brief description of sustainability-related themes chosen for themed semesters, years, or first-year experiences:

The College of Arts and Sciences Themester program is described as "Grounded in our undergraduate curriculum, Themesters are imagined as extended opportunities to engage with students, colleagues, and the wider community in conversation on challenging issues. We hope that Themesters will be a catalyst for students and faculty alike to move our curriculum and research forward in exciting directions. Themesters should also push boundaries by encouraging us to reconsider old truths and investigate new perspectives. We want to use Themester to promote cross-departmental collaboration and thus to experiment with bridging disciplines and approaches."

Since its inception, a number of Themester themes have aligned with sustainability-related themes.

2015 - At Work: The Nature of Labor on a Changing Planet. Today we are undergoing a seismic shift in the way we experience our work lives. Accepted generalizations about labor and work have been thrown into doubt by robots, networks, algorithms, and the rise of global finance. The notion of lifelong stable work for a single employer or even in a single economic sector has all but vanished. Consumerism rather than labor generates our cultural and economic values and self-fulfillment. The relationship between work and leisure has undergone a major transformation. Education, training, and skills can hardly keep up with the ever-changing demands of fluid workplaces. Communication technology has decoupled the workplace as a geographic or social unit from the realm of production and profit and accelerated our perception of time. As unprecedented as the new US workforce is, however, much of the world still works in circumstances difficult to relate to our own, as industrial wage-laborers or in precarious informal economies. Themester 2015 will explore the cultural, technological, and historical legacy, the contemporary significance, and future implications of these dramatic and ongoing changes in the worlds of work.

2014 - Eat, Drink, Think: Food from Art to Science. This Themester aims to provoke debate and discussion concerning the vast networks of peoples, technologies, and environmental systems that make even the simplest meal possible. Common issues that demand our attention in contemporary times include: What are the implications of state regulation of diet and nutrition for a society founded on a commitment to individual liberty? How much responsibility should the diner or chef bear for the way the food that they serve was harvested or processed? How can we feed 10 billion people without causing irreparable ecological damage, and should we care about how equitably that food is distributed? These and other questions explore the ways in which our representations and consumption of food connects us to our social, cultural, and biological worlds.

2013 - Connectedness: Networks in a Complex World. We link to one another, to the virtual world, and to various environments through networks that exist at all levels of human activity. Networks are more than neutral, random or sterile connecting structures. They can facilitate or deny access to a wide array of resources, and provide real intervention points for social, institutional and global change. Themester 2013 focuses squarely on the role of connectedness as a force in society and in our lives as unique individuals, partners, citizens and members of a global community. Whether particles, people or policies, human experience is embedded in dynamic streams of networks that shape our very existence.

2012 - Good Behavior, Bad Behavior: Molecules to Morality. Themester 2012 explores the meanings of "good behavior" and its counterpart “bad behavior” in all senses: aesthetic, ethical, adaptive, useful, essential, etc., applied to the realms of the living and non-living. Our discussions encompass moral philosophy, behavioral biology, the social sciences, mathematics, law, material science, cosmology, the literary, visual, and dramatic arts, and more. All contribute to our understanding of the possibilities and limits of telling good from bad and behaving accordingly.

2011 - Making War, Making Peace. in what ways are both war and peace implicated by the use of violence to achieve so-called “desirable” results? How does our understanding of wartime violence shape how we imagine “peace,” or vice versa, how might the production of a “positive peace” through efforts like the promotion of human rights, campaigns for nonviolence, efforts at reconciliation, etc. influence the ways in which we cognitively engage the practices and conditions of war? And what are the consequences—intended and otherwise—for how we animate warlike or peace building attitudes and behaviors?

2010 - sustain•ability: Thriving on a Small Planet. The Fall 2010 Themester will catalyze IUB’s emerging leadership in sustainability, providing students and faculty an opportunity to begin the interdisciplinary work needed to create sustainable communities locally and around the world, and creating an educational opportunity for undergraduates that they will carry far into the future.


The website URL where information about the theme is available:
A brief description of program(s) through which students can learn sustainable life skills:

The Green Room Certification Program (GRCP) was introduced to IU in 2011 through a brilliant collaboration between Residential Programs and Services (RPS), the Residence Hall Association (RHA), and the Office of Sustainability (IUOS). Since then, GRCP has strived to inspire students to experience a sustainable lifestyle of their own making.

The GRCP provides students with the opportunity to reduce IU’s carbon footprint and reinforce a culture of sustainability at IU. The GRCP supports and celebrates every campus-dwelling student who strives to live more sustainably by adopting sustainable habits and choosing to use eco-friendly products.

All students currently living in any of the IUB residence halls have the option to Green Certify their room. Certification is easy: simply complete 20 of the 47 criteria on the Green Room Checklist (however, students are not limited to 20 criteria). By certifying their rooms, students are actively creating a brighter future for the campus and the world. As a thank you for their sustainably-minded decisions, certified students receive a certificate to hang on their door and a free insulated water bottle!

This program is primarily run by an intern through the Office of Sustainability.

The IU Sustainability webpage also provides resources for living sustainability on campus.


The website URL where information about the sustainable life skills program(s) is available:
A brief description of sustainability-focused student employment opportunities:

The IU Office of Sustainability has an internship program that employs several undergraduate and graduate students. The internship program currently has two sessions: Summer and the Academic Year. During the Summer Program sessions interns work 20 hours per week and are enrolled in a 1-credit seminar designed to provide students a background in sustainability and a forum for collaborating. The Academic Year Program sessions employ interns for 10-15 hours a week. Academic Year interns participate in an informal seminar focused primarily on communication between interns. Undergraduate students receive $10/hour for their work, while graduate students receive $12/hour.

At the end of the internship, the student interns put on a symposium to share their progress. The event typically features three sustainability internship presentations, a poster session featuring work from each of the interns, and lunch featuring local food. There is no cost to attend.


The website URL where information about the student employment opportuntities is available:
A brief description of graduation pledges through which students pledge to consider social and environmental responsibility in future job and other decisions:

None at this time.


The website URL where information about the graduation pledge program is available:
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A brief description of other co-curricular sustainability programs and initiatives:
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The website URL where information about other co-curricular sustainability programs and initiatives is available:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
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The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.