Environmental Sustainability

A 2023 “Top Green College”
— Princeton Review Guide to Green Colleges: 2023 Edition

The Princeton Review Guide to Green Colleges: 2023 Edition provides a comprehensive measure of a school’s performance as an environmentally aware and prepared institution.

Specifically, it includes:

Whether students have a quality of life on campus that is both healthy and sustainable
How well a school is preparing students for employment in an increasingly green economy
How environmentally responsible a school’s policies are

According to The Princeton Review, out of the over 710 schools considered for this project, all 455 Green Colleges (which includes the University of Maine at Farmington) profiled on its site are, in their opinion, truly up to the task of training the next generation of leaders, people who will be responsible for putting green ideas into practice.

The Princeton Review chose the 455 colleges based on its 2021–22 survey of administrators at 713 colleges concerning their institutions’ sustainability-related policies, practices, and programs. The Review’s editors analyzed more than 25 data points from the survey to tally Green Rating scores for the schools on a scale of 60 to 99. Colleges that earned a Green Rating score of 80 or higher, such as UMF, were chosen for the Guide to Green Colleges.

UMF made the Princeton Review Top Green College list in 2023, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2014, 2013 and 2012.

A 2021-2022 “Most Affordable Eco-friendly College”
— Best Choice Colleges

Best Choice Colleges named the University of Maine at Farmington one of the Top #20 Most Affordable Eco-friendly Colleges in the Nation.

To decide the 50 Most Affordable Eco-Friendly Colleges, Best Choice Colleges consulted organizations such as the Sierra Club, U.S. News & World Report, and The Princeton Review to come up with American colleges and universities that have a solid reputation as “eco-friendly.”

From there, it consulted nearly 100 universities’ own websites to determine the annual undergraduate tuition. Finally, it ranked each university from lowest to highest annual tuition, in order to determine the 50 most affordable.

All of the schools on the list have unique structures or lifestyle characteristics that make them leaders in sustainability. They have all earned formal “green” ratings from one major agency or another, and most have been recognized by respected groups dedicated to protecting the environment

Whether you’re looking for an education in order to pursue a career in environmentalism, or are just interested in living a life of sustainability, Farmington is dedicated to the idea of sustainable living: a LEED-certified building, a sustainable biomass heating facility, geo-thermal wells for heating and cooling campus buildings, even an on-campus community vegetable garden. Here at UMF, you don’t need to spend a fortune in tuition and fees just to attend a responsibly eco-friendly college.

Learning by doing – the UMF Sustainable Campus Coalition

At Farmington, students learn about sustainable environmental practices — making environmental benefits apparent to students, faculty, staff and the community. Here, environmental issues are studied throughout the curriculum.

The UMF Sustainable Campus Coalition, an organization of students, faculty, staff and community members, actively promotes environmental sustainability on campus and in the area community.

Public education, collaborations with community organizations, municipalities and schools, assessment and mitigation planning associated with greenhouse gas emissions, improvement of recycling on campus, development of a campus organic garden and orchard, encouragement of local food and institutional composting and reduction of automobile idling are all part of the Coalition’s broad environmental mission.

Goals of the Sustainable Campus Coalition:

To reduce the environmental impact of the campus
To educate ourselves, the campus, and the community about environmental sustainability in order to encourage everyone to reduce their impact
To promote collaboration, camaraderie and a bond among students, faculty, staff and the community
To have fun pursuing the first three goals.

The UMF Sustainable Campus Coalition was instrumental in UMF being honored by the U.S. House of Representatives for energy solutions that reduce greenhouse gases and long-term energy costs and being an inspiration in making a clean energy campus a reality.

Making “Going Green” Fun

The Sustainable Campus Coalition organizes and hosts a number of fun annual events at UMF and in the surrounding Farmington community designed to promote awareness of sustainability issues in creative and fun ways. The events typically draw a wide cross-section of the campus and community participants.

Some of the Sustainable Campus Coalition’s annual events

Trash Day
350 Day
Campus Energy Challenge
Recycled Sledding Contest
Salvage and Recycle
UMF Sustainability Carnival
Earth Day Celebration
and more

The Sustainable Campus Coalition’s Leadership Role on Campus

In addition to its leadership role in extensive (and very popular) campus-wide recycling programs, food and waste reduction in the dining halls, indoor and outdoor campus lighting energy reduction and more, the Sustainable Campus Coalition serves the UMF administration as advisors on all things green.

The largely student-led group makes recommendations and offers solutions to a wide range of energy efficiency and environmental issues on campus — and the administration actually acts on their advice! (This doesn’t happen at all colleges.)

The Sustainable Campus Coalition led the planning of the geothermal heating / cooling project, the planning and advising for the LEED-certified Francis Allen Black Residence Hall; and the LEED-certified Kalikow Education Center, UMF’s second largest building.

UMF added biomass to its energy portfolio — another huge commitment toward the University becoming nearly fossil fuel-free.

As an educational institution, the University of Maine at Farmington is a recognized leader in promoting the sustainable use of the Earth’s resources. UMF demonstrates by its policies and practices that sustainable practices are an integral part of the campus culture.

The UMF Biomass Central Heating Plant is the largest single biomass hot water heating plant in Maine
It replaces 390,000 gallons (95%) of the heating oil formerly used to heat buildings on campus
It heats 83% of the campus with approximately 4,500 tons of hardwood chips per year
It uses Maine wood chips sourced within a 50-mile radius of the University as its fuel source
It decreases the University’s carbon emissions by 4,000 tons per year
The UMF Biomass Plant was featured in College Planning & Management magazine

In addition, hidden beneath the University’s beautiful campus green lies a sophisticated infrastructure of geothermal wells that use the natural passive energy of the earth to help heat many of the campus’s buildings.

Additional geothermal wells in other campus locations also heat the UMF Fitness & Recreation Center and the LEED-Certified Theo Kalikow Education Center — two of the largest facilities on campus.

Taking the LEED

LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design and is a national rating system from the U.S. Green Building Council. It is designed to promote and accelerate the development and implementation of green building practices.

Opened in 2006, the Kalikow Education Center earned UMF’s second LEED Green Building Certification from the U.S. Green Building Council. Previously, Francis Allen Black Hall, the University’s newest residence hall, received UMF’s first LEED certification.

The University is careful in the management and operations of building and renovating, in reducing pollution and waste, in using appropriate energy resources and materials, and in protecting and incorporating the native environment in campus spaces.

The University of Maine at Farmington was named a 2014-15 “50 Great Affordable Eco-Friendly College” by Best Choice Schools.com, a noted college search website. It reviewed more than 300 universities across the U.S., and selected just 50 fifty it believes to be the very best eco-friendly schools under $25,000 a year. Best Choice Schools recognized UMF to be among a number of colleges that have proven themselves as dedicated to the idea of sustainable living.

Best Choice Schools.com noted UMF’s two new LEED-certified campus buildings (Frances Allen Black Hall and Education Center). It also mentioned the UMF Sustainable Campus Coalition, a campus organization that initiates a number of projects to encourage campus sustainability. The website singled out one popular UMF Sustainable Campus Coalition project — its annual Recycled Sledding Contest, brings students together to create sleds out of recycled materials.

A 2019 “Top Green College”
— Princeton Review Guide to 413 Green Colleges

The Princeton Review’s Guide to 413 Green Colleges provides a comprehensive measure of a school’s performance as an environmentally aware and prepared institution.