Keene State College
AC-6: Sustainability Literacy Assessment

Which of the following choices or activities describe your current lifestyle? (multiple choice list provided) What is meant by the term “carbon footprint”? (multiple choice list provided) Put the following list in order of the activities with the largest environmental impact to those with the smallest environmental impact A. Keeping a cell phone charger plugged into an electrical outlet for 12 hours B. Producing one McDonalds quarter-pound hamburger C. Producing one McDonalds chicken sandwich D. Flying in a commercial airplane from Washington DC to China A technique to assess environmental impacts associated with all stages of a product’s life from cradle to grave (resource extraction through usage and disposal or reuse) is called: (Multiple choice list provided) Imagine that we had to pay for all the costs associated with the manufacturing of the goods we use every day. What would go into calculating the true costs of a product? (Choose all that apply -- list provided) The term for products nature provides free of charge such as clean water, clean air, productive soils, habitat for diverse species, and pollination of plants is: Multiple choice list provided What factors influence human population’s impact on Earth’s resources? (Choose all that apply) Multiple choice list provided Which of the following populations has the highest rate of growth? (Multiple choice list provided) 26 total questions comprise the assessment.

A draft sustainability literacy assessment was developed and administered in 2013-2014. Based on the results of the pilot, the assessment is currently being revised for administration in 2017-2018. A literature search was done for Sustainability Assessments from academia and business and examples were reviewed from other academic institutions. The draft assessment was written by the Sustainability Officer and reviewed by Environmental Studies and Sustainable Product Design and Innovation. It was also vetted by the Institutional Research and Assessment Office.

The Sustainability Officer worked with the Institutional Research and Assessment Office and the IT Department. to administer the assessment to 50% of the incoming first year students and 50% of the Senior students. This was a on-line assessment sent directly to a randomly chosen 50% of first year and 50% of Senior students through the College's academic portal.

Many first year students come to campus with some idea of what Sustainability means and they are aware actions they can personally take to be more sustainable. Generally they do not know as much about the wider world, or even where the energy, food, or other resources they use every day comes from. The Senior students were much more aware of the world around them, as well as how their own actions impact that world, in part due to classes they had taken at Keene State.