Stories indexed with the term ‘sustainability’

University of Michigan Board of Regents meeting (Dec. 17, 2009): The December meeting of the UM Board of Regents was packed with presentations – on entrepreneurship, a new enrollment policy for Ph.D. students, and environmental sustainability efforts on campus.

Regents also approved the naming of the Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospital, reflecting a $15 million gift to the institution – part of the massive $754 million C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital and Women’s Hospital complex being built and expected to open in 2012.

The board signed off on several facilities projects, including interior work on offices at the former Pfizer site, now called the North Campus Research Complex (NCRC), as well as the next step in renovations of the Couzens Hall dormitory.

Also approved was a letter making UM’s annual operating request to the state, which laid out why legislators should appropriate funds to support the university in fiscal 2011. The letter, under the signature of UM president Mary Sue Coleman, did not request a specific dollar amount.

Coleman kicked off the meeting, as she typically does, with some opening remarks that led to news about plans to hold the April 2010 regents meeting in an unusual location: Grand Rapids. [Full Story]

“I want to demystify canning and make you feel powerful!” quipped Molly Notarianni, holding up a Mason jar full of jam. She was speaking to a group crammed into a room at the Rudolf Steiner High School, who’d come to learn about canning, oven building, medicinal plants and other skills of self-reliance.

This day-long event wasn’t just a dabbling into traditional domestic arts. Saturday’s Re-Skilling Festival – which drew about 150 people to Steiner’s bucolic campus on Pontiac Trail – fits into a broader effort, one that aims to strengthen the local economy and gird the community for a time of dramatically reduced resources.

Called Transition Ann Arbor, it’s led by a small group of residents who aren’t elected officials, aren’t business leaders, aren’t even all among the usual suspects of community activists. So who are they, and what exactly are they doing? [Full Story]

University of Michigan Board of Regents (March 19, 2009): Much of this month’s meeting of the University of Michigan Board of Regents was spent hearing from students who were advocating for three issues: A coordinated sustainability effort on campus, a tuition freeze, and UM’s investment in HEI Hotels & Resorts.

In her opening remarks, UM president Mary Sue Coleman praised the performance of several athletic teams, including men’s basketball, hockey, swimming and diving – all were competing at the national level, most notably the basketball team in a NCAA tournament appearance. She said in the midst of this was also sad news about the sudden death of Matthew Hilton-Watson, a 40-year-old UM-Flint professor who collapsed in class and died earlier this month, as well as the death of Bill Davidson, whom Coleman described as a “true gentleman,” philanthropist and exceptional business leader.

Coleman used the reference to Davidson’s business acumen as a segue into announcing that UM will ask employees to share a greater amount of their health care costs. She described employee health care as the university budget’s fastest-growing expense and a threat to its core mission. Details of those changes were released on Friday, the day after the regents meeting. [Full Story]

University of Michigan Board of Regents (Feb. 19, 2009): At their most recent monthly meeting, UM regents got a detailed report about the community benefits provided by its health system, and heard from several students lobbying the university to establish a sustainability office.

Most items on the agenda – including approval of over $13 million in construction projects – received little or no discussion among regents or UM’s executive officers. [Full Story]