- Information For:
- Spring Civic Engagement Day
- Engagement Day application
Inspired by the Student Senate-initiated “Go Green: Marching Towards Environmental Awareness” campaign in March 2007, the faculty instituted a civic engagement theme to shape academic and student-life programming throughout the academic year. The theme chosen for 2007-08 is Environmental Stewardship: Living in a Natural World.
Dr. James M. Harder spoke about the university’s history of environmental stewardship in his first President’s Forum Harder recounted initiatives at Bluffton made during the last number of years that are already saving on energy consumption, such as nighttime ice-making machines, which air condition Musselman Library, Marbeck Center, Yoder Recital Hall, Ramseyer Hall and Neufeld Hall. An environmentally sound turf management system was implemented on Bluffton’s athletics fields this summer, resulting in healthier grass while cutting total irrigation water use by about half.
While much has been accomplished, more can always be done. "There are untapped opportunities for recycling," said President Harder. "Imagine the benefit to the environment if we could recycle even half of the printed paper we generate each year on campus." He commended the Bluffton University Student Senate for its interest in expanding the recycling program on campus, and pledged his support to achieving this during the coming year as one specific legacy of the environmental stewardship civic engagement theme.
