Overall Rating Gold
Overall Score 65.28
Liaison Ciara Tennis
Submission Date Nov. 3, 2022

STARS v2.2

Eastern Connecticut State University
AC-1: Academic Courses

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 14.00 / 14.00 Stephen Nathan
Environmental Earth Science Professor
Environmental Earth Science
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Part 1. Sustainability course offerings

Figures required to calculate the percentage of courses offered by the institution that are sustainability course offerings:
Undergraduate Graduate
Total number of courses offered by the institution 545 32
Number of sustainability-focused courses offered 27 0
Number of sustainability-inclusive courses offered 88 1

Percentage of courses that are sustainability course offerings:
20.10

Part 2. Sustainability course offerings by department

Total number of academic departments that offer courses:
18

Number of academic departments with sustainability course offerings:
17

Percentage of academic departments with sustainability course offerings:
94.44

Documentation

A copy of the institution’s inventory of its sustainability course offerings and descriptions:
Do the figures reported above cover one, two, or three academic years?:
One

A brief description of the methodology used to complete the course inventory :
The university first defined the terms "sustainability-focused" and "sustainability-related" as they applied to courses. The definitions used are available online https://www.easternct.edu/sustainable-energy-studies/educationandresearch.html. The course descriptions available online were used to determine if the course matched the definitions outlined by the university and AASHE, and were used to update the inventory completed in 2021, which used faculty responses from the courses survey. The Green Campus Committee developed a courses survey and disseminated the link via email to all faculty at the end of the spring 2021 semester. The survey asked faculty if their courses focus on, or relate to, the three pillars of sustainability (planet, people, prosperity), and had respondents identify which courses that met these pillars were sustainability-focused and sustainability-inclusive. We had 77 responses (~10% response rate).

How were courses with multiple offerings or sections counted for the figures reported above?:
Each course was counted as a single course regardless of the number of offerings or sections

A brief description of how courses with multiple offerings or sections were counted:
N/A

Optional Fields 

Website URL where information about the sustainability course offerings is available:
Additional documentation to support the submission:
Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
Data for this credit reflects the 2022-2023 academic year, specifically for fall 2022.

Data on the number of courses offered by Eastern and the number of departments was provided by Matt Hancock, Assistant Director of Institutional Research.

The inventory was reviewed by Patty Szczys, Director of the Institute for Sustainability, and Ciara Tennis, University Assistant for Climate and Sustainability Initiatives.

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.