University of Wisconsin-River Falls
AC-8: Campus as a Living Laboratory

Multiple classes tour the heating plant to discuss Scope 2 emissions and efficiency annually. It's important to note that all grade levels, from elementary to university, tour the Plant as well as UWRF employees by request.

The Ag Engineering, Renewable Energy Class toured the Solar Photovoltaic System at the Regional Development Institute Building on campus to learn about the fixed roof panels, pole-mounted dual-axis tracking array, inverts and controls.

Eleven additional classes requested and received campus sustainability tours in 2017. Tours focused on buildings, landscaping, and programmatic efforts all focused on sustainability. The specific challenges for advancing sustainability in relation to buildings was discussed during each tour.

AGEN 325, Alternative Energy Systems:

Students in Ag Engineering Technology are pressing soybeans to produce oil for Biodiesel production.

Students in Agricultural Engineering Technology are participating in an Undergraduate Research Project (URSCA) to evaluate and refine a small scale methane digester using Dairy manure from the Mann Valley Farm.

Students in AGEN 325 Alternate Energy Systems - use data from campus solar panels at RDI for class study. Also, field tours for understanding installation details.

Students in AGEN 240 Structures - tour the University Center and study the energy saving characteristics of the building.

Students in Agricultural Engineering Technology are evaluating the efficiency of LED lighting for food production in a garden tower.

The Biology Department has been conducting a research program focused on honey bees since 2011. In addition to the classroom work during the fall and spring semester, the Biology Department has 4 students that also work on research projects over the summer. The byproduct of building up the bee population for the various genetic studies is honey. The Biology department and the UWRF food service provider, Chartwells, has now formed a partnership. Since Chartwells has already established UWRF Falcon Foods as a vendor to purchase product through, the Biology Department now goes through Falcon Foods so Chartwells can purchase the honey.

Ag Engineering Technology uses the campus land to teach land surveying techniques, and also has assisted with the design and construction of surface water best practices at the Mann Valley Farm in the past for farmyard runoff control.

Horticulture students have also been working on retention basins and rain gardens within the institutional boundary. A new rain garden planned, designed, and planted by a class was added south of the campus greenhouse during the Fall 2016 semester. Sustainability signage for the rain garden will be added in 2018.

In 2016, we also had a student design a new outdoor classroom space which was then created by our grounds department.

In May 2017, a Series on Innovation and Excellence event on campus highlighted the sustainability of our campus grounds as well as the research plots and relevant areas used for faculty and student research as well as learning opportunities.

Students in the ESM 220 course often request purchasing information as they work on a project to further a sustainability initiative on campus.

As the Purchasing Agent for UWRF Facilities Management, Roxanne Schneberger has provided information to students for their reports and classroom work:
1. Requests for lists of the vendors that are used in our area of Wisconsin and Minnesota are utilized to show outsourcing to local and area vendors for Building and Construction.
2. The heating fuel delivered, including the costs per delivery, for the Mann Valley Farm annually is provided to students. They use the figures for the energy costs to support their animals.

FY 2016-The central Purchasing Services North Hall office sets an example by administering the office supply contract which offers many green/ecological alternatives to standard products. We have a high usage of re-manufactured ink toner cartridges for campus printers and we use recycled paper exclusively. We are also assisting our IT Department to reduce the amount of printing in general. We only purchase energy-star appliances and try to reuse furniture on other areas on campus whenever possible. We utilize green cleaning products exclusively.

In 2017, multiple students have contacted the Office of Sustainability regarding carpooling, biking, parking, and other transportation related issues. In a few cases, students used that information to write reports or papers or to propose ways we can further our efforts. This also triggered interest and the facilitation of a campus transportation survey.

Enterprise Car Share program is available to students. Mark Klapatch, Sustainability and Custodial Supervisor has shared information on the program with professors to share in their classrooms as well as promoted the initiative on the UW-River Falls Sustainability Facebook page and axis TV slides.

https://www.uwrf.edu/Sustainability/CampusInitiatives/Transportation.cfm

WeBike River Falls
We Bike River Falls promotes bicycle friendly transportation and recreation options through education and awareness programs for a safe, healthy, and sustainable community. We Bike River Falls is a collaborative project through the UWRF Office of Sustainability, UW Extension, and the UWRF Office of Student Life and engaging a broad group of university faculty and staff, students, River Falls citizens, city officials, and others.

The campus and community are also partnering on a community-wide bike sharing program which was officially launched in April, 2016. The campus housed one of the bike racks through the fall 2017 Blue Bike season.

UWRF incorporates the topics of refuse and recycling in many aspects of campus operations and culture. During the spring 2016 semester, the Office of Sustainability offered a waste minimization internship. The intern evaluated current collection processes on campus, reviewed best practices at other institutions, conducted a campus wide waste minimization survey to all faculty, staff, and students, analyzed the survey content, and ultimately made a proposal for where we can improve our efforts. The internship resulted in 2 pilot projects on campus to see if we can increase our recycling percentage. The detailed information gathered through this internship was also used for a bin grant proposal. In November 2016, UWRF received a bin grant conducted through Keep America Beautiful and Coca Cola. We received 70 bins. Students participated in bin audits to determine where new bins should be located.

Our considerable waste diversion effort includes a comprehensive recycling program and a surplus property program. Each year, more and more types of items are recycled as we find additional recycling streams. We have also increased our communication to campus regarding our refuse and recycling operations. We have switched from 2 surplus sales each year to a monthly sale. We also do regular online auctions. The switch to monthly sales has also provided us with the opportunity to sell used computers and computer components. We had previously been paying to have these items properly recycled. We have also increased the variety of items we try to sell through the surplus program to divert even small items from landfills. If items do not sell after a few sales, they are given away for free or donated to area nonprofit organizations. We have a student who works closely with the surplus program who has a passion for recycling and she has utilized several marketing avenues to better promote surplus to the students on campus. We are now starting to have regular customers as monthly sales are really becoming a standard on campus and people look forward to the variety of items we come up with.

We also have students that coordinate campus cleanup days. There is also an increasing number of students requesting interviews for papers or other coursework.

Participation in RecycleMania tournament, 2016.
UWRF participates in the national RecycleMania competition each year. In 2016 we promoted our involvement with student posters in the residence halls and academic buildings.
RecycleMania is a friendly competition and benchmarking tool for college and university recycling programs to promote waste reduction activities to their campus communities. Over an 8-week period each spring, colleges across the United States and Canada report the amount of recycling and trash collected each week and are in turn ranked in various categories based on who recycles the most on a per capita basis, as well as which schools have the best recycling rate as a percentage of total waste and which schools generate the least amount of combined trash and recycling. With each week’s updated ranking, participating schools follow their performance against other colleges and use the results to rally their campus to reduce and recycle more.

Overall Goals for RecycleMania
1. Motivate students and staff to increase recycling efforts and reduce waste generation.
2. Generate attention and support for campus recycling programs.
3. Encourage colleges to measure and benchmark recycling activity in their effort to improve their programs over time.
4. Have a fair and friendly competition.

http://recyclemaniacs.org/about

Each semester in the Environmental Sustainability class (ESM 220) students are asked to conduct a modified waste assessment in campus buildings and a short survey of campus-members about waste and recycling habits. Students choose a building on campus and visually inspect the trash and recycling containers throughout the building. They note the types of materials most commonly found in receptacles, the percentage of "contamination" in each container (i.e. Trash in the recycling containers and recycling in the trash containers), and the informational materials provided to guide users as they decide which container is most appropriate for their waste disposal.

Courses use the South Fork for water monitoring ESM 360 (Hydrology and Water Quality). Retention ponds behind Hathorn Hall are used to educate students on hydraulic pressure.

The campus also hosts each Spring a St. Croix River Basin conference and provides free registration to students to encourage their participation.

Several courses in CAFES use the South Fork of the Kinnickinnic River for lab exercises.

Through MAMAC Systems, the institution provides UWRF student, faculty, and staff with a national pilot demonstration project for 24/7 energy and water use data in a variety of buildings across campus. The two buildings are Grimm and McMillan Residence Halls. This real-time availability of data allows the campus community to see the impacts of our conscious decisions on the conservation of these resources and the direct costs to students and taxpayers in the form of utility bills.

The Student Senate has introduced sustainability-based initiatives like Enterprise CarShare and Divestment from oil. This fosters campus consciousness of fossil fuel dependence, climate awareness, and the national divestment campaign.

The Student Senate's Committee for Advancing Sustainability Efforts (CASE) was created Fall 2015 with the goal of raising awareness and support for a sustainability student fee. They also hosted a regional climate summit during the spring 2016 semester where they brought together campus leaders from all over the region to discuss climate change and student led initiatives. A committee was once again formed in 2017 to research and propose a green fund for the campus. More work on the green fund will continue in 2018.

Multicultural programming is a foundation of UWRF Student Life. Inclusivity is an underlying value system for UWRF's Strategic Initiatives. All students take a course in American Cultural Diversity as a requirement of graduation.

The Falcon Investment Team (students), under CBE faculty supervision, has been allocated investable funds by the UWRF Foundation focused on a portfolio of ESG companies as part of the Glenn Potts Trading Room in South Hall.

UWRF students, faculty, and staff are actively involved with the community Powerful Choices committee. Programs and partnerships such as the Blue Bike Program and Community Solar have been offshoots of that activity.

Each spring students, faculty, and staff focus on health and wellness in the Wellness Challenge https://www.uwrf.edu/StudentHealthAndCounseling/WellnessChallenge.cfm

Additional Wellness activities and initiatives include: Therapy dog time:

http://www.uwrf.edu/StudentHealthAndCounseling/Wellness/WellnessEvents.cfm

Health Fair activities: http://www.uwrf.edu/studenthealthandcounseling/healthfair.cfm

CPR training offered each February.

Campus Recreation offers a number of opportunities for students and staff to be physically active and involved with campus. Intramurals, Sport Clubs, Falcon Outdoors Adventures, and Fitness programs provide unique activities for all interest. We promote the use of our Open Recreation, open climbing, and open skating opportunities as a chance for individuals to create active lifelong habits of physical activity.

http://www.uwrf.edu/rsf

Smoke-free campus initiative that went into effect July 2013.

Students are also active members on the Health and Wellness Committee as well as the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Other Drug (ATOD) Committee.

Faculty and Students are currently actively engaged with the City of River Falls in exploring and researching plant options for underneath the new Community Solar Garden panels on the north side of town.