McMaster’s first university-wide Sustainability Strategy launches today with a collective commitment to engage students, faculty and staff in transforming our campus into a living laboratory for sustainability.

The Sustainability Strategy includes four drivers:

• A Culture Focused on Sustainability: McMaster will grow its commitment to collaborating across campus to promote a culture of sustainability in areas such as leadership and vision, communications, strategic partnerships and engagement, as well as professional development learning opportunities.
• Teaching, Learning and Research: McMaster researchers are working every day to tackle the most pressing challenges facing our communities and our planet. McMaster also depends on its students to be active partners in sustainability. McMaster will support sustainable research, teaching, and learning, as well interdisciplinary learning, the digital learning environment and campus as a living laboratory.
• Self-Sustaining Campus: McMaster recognizes the interconnectedness between the health of the environment and the community’s well-being by focusing on active and alternative transportation, eco parks and greenspace, and food systems.
• Operational Excellence: McMaster will transform our administrative and operational practices to be more sustainable in areas such as infrastructure, water and energy, with the goal of becoming a carbon-free campus. McMaster is committed to responsible investing and sustainable procurement, to improving waste reduction and recycling, and to developing time-bound goals using metrics as a benchmark.

“Our first-ever Sustainability Strategy aligns with McMaster’s vision to advance societal health and well-being and strengthens our connections with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals,” says McMaster president David Farrar.

“Now it is up to all of us to collaborate across the university, set ambitious goals, and commit to a more sustainable future.”

During months of community consultation, more than 2,600 McMaster community members took part in an online survey to help develop the strategy.  An additional 130 students, faculty and staff shared perspectives through interviews, helping to shape the strategy and test the university’s guiding principles.

“Listening to community voices helped the Office of Sustainability team develop the principles to guide the strategy, including always looking through a lens of Indigeneity, focusing on equity and inclusion, and collaborating with our community to tailor solutions,” says Debbie Martin, chief facilities officer.

“These principles will guide our progress, which we plan to share, recognize and celebrate along the way.”

Check out the Sustainability Strategy online and help plant trees at McMaster. For every 20 views of the strategy, the Office of Sustainability will provide a tree to the McMaster Carbon Sink Forest, planting up to 250 trees. 

To share your feedback on the strategy, please email the Office of Sustainability.