National Wildlife Ferderation Study Praises Furman University Sustainability Projects

GREENVILLE, SC – December 4, 2009 – Efforts of Furman University students to decrease their carbon footprint are featured in the National Wildlife Federation’s just released study, Generation E: Students Leading for a Sustainable, Clean Energy Future.

“We scouted projects at more than 160 colleges and universities all across the country. In more than 20 years of supporting student environmental leaders, we’ve never seen this extraordinary degree of student engagement and creativity around sustainability at every level,” said Julian Keniry, the NWF’s senior director of campus and community leadership.

Sustainability is meant to ensure that the resources and opportunities of this generation will be available in the future through conservation and stewardship of the environment.

The NWF study, which showcases examples of outstanding student involvement in sustainability, highlights an award-winning film made by Furman freshmen. “The Lifestyle Project” focuses on the attempts by first-year Furman students to reduce their ecological impact by reducing water and energy consumption and eating a vegetarian diet, for example.

The study also cites Furman’s Sustainability Fair and the distribution of clothes-drying racks to cut down on the use of energy-gulping dryers.

“Our findings demolish the myth that students are apathetic or sitting on the sidelines,” Keniry added. “Their voices are rising up in ways we haven’t heard since the civil rights or the peace movements of the ’60s and ’70s, but the irony is, we are finding that most campus educators and leaders at the state and federal levels aren’t really listening.”Go to www.nwf.org/GenE for more information on the Generation E study and to view the initiatives of 165 schools in 46 states and the District of Columbia.