The Sustainable Endowments Institute has ranked UVM among the top 15 schools nationally for green practices and policies, giving the school an overall grade of A- in its annual College Sustainability Report Card.

The university joins Harvard University, Dartmouth College, Middlebury College, Carleton College and the University of Washington as the only U.S. colleges and universities to receive an A- for two consecutive years. The institute, which ranked 200 schools last year and 300 in 2008, including those in Canada, also gave A-minuses to Oberlin College, the University of New Hampshire, Columbia University, Dickinson College, Brown University, the University of Colorado, the University of Pennsylvania, Stanford University and the University of British Columbia.

The institute graded schools with the largest endowments in seven categories and then awarded an overall grade. Its aim is to show a correlation between an institution's green practices and its investment decisions. In addition to its overall grade, UVM received A's in the following categories: Administration; Climate Change and Energy; Food & Recycling; Green Building; and Shareholder Engagement. It received B's in Student Involvement; Transportation; Endowment Transparency; and Investment Priorities.

A number of specific programs and initiatives helped boost UVM's score. President Daniel Mark Fogel's signing of the President's Climate Commitment, the creation of the sustainability office and the President's Commission on Sustainability in 2008 were cited under the Administration category. Other initiatives highlighted under categories where the university received A's included a clean energy fund to pay for renewable energy projects recommended by a committee of primarily students; the tracking of carbon emissions since 2002; UVM's commitment to purchase 30 percent of its food from Vermont-based companies; a diversion of approximately 35 percent of its solid waste through a comprehensive recycling and composting program; and the requirement that all new buildings and major renovations be LEED Silver certified at a minimum as has been the case with all new buildings since 2005.

Since the release of the institute's inaugural 2007 report, UVM has been included in a number of sustainability and environmentally-based rankings. Sierra ranked the university third in the country in its annual Green College Guide for the number and quality of the university's environmental initiatives in a feature titled "10 Coolest Schools." Forbes.com named UVM one of "America's 10 Greenest Colleges and Universities" and University Business magazine named the university one of its 10 "Higher Education Sustainability Stars" for its "efforts to respect the environment and the communities that surround them in economically feasible ways." UVM was also listed as one of the nation's "Top 25 Environmentally Responsible Schools" by the Kaplan College Guide 2009 for its wide range of environmentally significant initiatives and commitment to long-term sustainability. A Cornell University survey of 28 leading institutions found UVM to among the nation's top five institutions as a leader in the field of environmental sustainability.

The College Sustainability Report Card 2008 is the third such report from the Sustainable Endowments Institute and is published as part of the Institutes broader effort to encourage discussion on sustainability in higher education. The Institute, a special project of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, receives funding from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, V. Kann Rasmussen Foundation and the Nathan Cummings Foundation, among others. The full College Sustainability Report Card 2008 is available on the Sustainable Endowments Institute website. The Sustainable Endowments Institute is a Cambridge-based nonprofit organization.