Why make any effort toward sustainability at Harvey Mudd College, since even the drastic step of closing down the whole campus would hardly be a drop in the bucket in terms of energy and water usage in the Los Angeles basin? Our mission statement provides the answer: HMC should emphasize environmental consciousness in our classrooms and lifestyles so that the students that graduate will have the technical savvy and broader awareness necessary to make the world more sustainable.

Mudd students today are interested in sustainability both as a tool for lowering the environmental impact of the campus and as a lens for interpreting and improving the world at large. Since the strategic planning exercises a year ago, a group of students has been studying HMC’s resource usage, how to incorporate environmental science into curricula and how Mudders might use their technical skills in hands-on projects. The group constitutes one of the largest and most active student organizations at the college, with weekly joint meetings of Mudders Organizing for Sustainability Solutions (MOSS) and HMC Engineers for a Sustainable World (ESW) regularly drawing two-dozen students and several committed faculty and staff.

MOSS/ESW have a full slate of activities for the upcoming year. Students will be auditing lighting on campus as part of Southern California Edison’s Campus Housing Energy Efficiency Program (CHEER). HMC will host a 5-C symposium to discuss global climate change as part of an event being held on college campuses nation wide. ESW, in cooperation with HMC trustee Andrea Leebron-Clay P99, will be planning a trip to Kenya to work on a sustainable development and education project. Additionally, MOSS/ESW will work to institutionalize sustainability in the HMC education by endowing an environmental Clinic and expanding the use of examples from environmental science in the Core. Finally, students will work in conjunction with Facilities and Maintenance, Dining Services, and the academic departments to implement recommendations from Professor Haskell’s summer research group, which conducted a full sustainability audit of campus.

At present, Harvey Mudd College is a great place to be interested in issues of sustainability and the environment. Many members of the HMC community have waited years to see the college make serious institutional changes regarding environmental responsibility, and the new strategic vision highlights sustainability as an important issue for the college. A fast-growing and enthusiastic student movement is feeding off of this fervor to help the college take on one of the major challenges facing scientists and engineers this century.