More College Rankings -- This Time on 'Greenness'

The annual hoopla of college rankings – practically an institution in and of itself – is something that most students, prospective and otherwise, are all too familiar with. The competitive fever of yearly publications such as U.S. News and World Report's Best Colleges, The Princeton Review College Rankings, and Forbes' America's Best Colleges (by no means an exhaustive list) spreads each fall like clockwork, and, as a recent Inside Higher Ed article explains, the lists' top tiers are usually no surprise.

However, a less traditional and increasingly important set of criteria is making its way into the ranking lexicon: the degree to which America's colleges and universities are "green" and the impact of their sustainability goals.

The green movement has been under way for some time, of course. Growing numbers of consumers are evaluating and supporting eco-conscious products and companies. Why shouldn't this also apply to schools, many of which are investing in sustainability-focused courses and curricula? Even my former community college is getting in on the action; in fact, agile and specialized community colleges around the country may be in a unique position to capitalize on the trend.

A recent New York Times article outlined some of the ranking systems that, along with the colleges they're tasked with evaluating, are hoping to attract tuition-payers in the green marketplace. The Princeton Review, already a seasoned veteran in the ranking business, has just released its second annual "green" grades. The other systems, however, are new to the ranking crowd: The Sierra Club's "eco-enlightened" colleges; The Sustainable Endowment Institute's College Sustainabililty Report Card; The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education's Sustainability Tracking, Assesment & Rating System (STARS).

The Princeton Review's Green Rankings were determined based on criteria developed with the help of ecoAmerica, a non-profit environmental organization. The "green" list was included in its main college rankings publication because, as Princeton Review V.P. and Publisher Robert Franek noted, college students and parents who participated in this year's "College Hopes & Worries Survey" expressed interest in the information. Franek unpacked the numbers: "66% of respondents overall (and 68% of students vs. 59% of parents) said they would value having information about a college's commitment to the environment – a 4% increase from last year's respondents. Among that cohort, 24% of respondents overall (26% of students vs. 18% of parents) said such information would 'very much' impact their (their child's) decision to apply to or attend the school." Fifteen schools received a top score, including Arizona State University, Yale, Dickinson College, and University of Washington.

The Sierra Club used eight categories to determine the scores of the 135 colleges: efficiency, energy, food, academics, purchasing, transportation, waste management, and administration. Scores were based on a "lengthy questionnaire" sent to college sustainability experts, and campuses that cited additional green initiatives were eligible for higher scores in categories under which such projects fell. Top schools include University of Colorado at Boulder (the highest scorer), University of Washington at Seattle, and Middlebury College.

The Sustainable Endowment Institute's College Sustainability Report Card and The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (the "STARS" methodology) both offered comprehensive scores based on criteria similar to those of the Sierra Club and Princeton. The Sustainability Report Card evaluated the 300 public and private colleges with the largest endowments, and all colleges can voluntarily submit reports to the STARS program.

Though they're certainly in the minority, some colleges have questioned and even refused to participate in parts or all of the U.S. News and other traditional ranking systems. Many agree that the way in which colleges are conventionally rated should be more nuanced and flexible -- even the traditional rating groups admit this, but it's nearly impossible to develop a methodology that can accurately gauge things such as, for instance, outcomes in learning or the academic rigor required for courses. College ranking is essentially limited to the qualities of a school that can be derived statistically.

In a 2007 New York Times article, Columbia University journalism professor Samuel G. Freedman called the annual U.S. News ratings a successful business endeavor while questioning their journalistic integrity. U.S. News publisher Kerry F. Dyer cited the feature as a "franchise" and "continually renewing market" that "sells 45,000 copies on the newsstand, 50 percent more than a routine issue. In book form, U.S. News sells hundreds of thousands of copies a year of its various college guides."

Such staggering numbers, even in 2007, suggest that parents and students still find college rankings useful, and while some may dismiss it as fad chasing or a marketing ploy, the foray into green rankings is an attempt to quantify and deliver a set of data that, as Franek of the Princeton Review said, is increasingly important to parents and students. For a decision as financially and academically significant as college matriculation, one can hardly fault their drive for extra information, or fault the businesses working to provide it. As green technology and markets continue to evolve, it will be important to ensure that our systems of evaluation do the same.