How HBCUs have learned to go green

It's not always easy being green – especially if you're a college or university that serves primarily minority students, many from low-income families. Going green requires up-front investment that many of these institutions believe they can't afford. Without large – or in some cases any – endowments, and dependent on tuitions that can't be increased much without pricing their students out of a college education, many institutions wonder if going green is feasible for colleges that serve students of color.

UNCF (United Negro College Fund) and its Building Green at Minority Serving Institutions program shows that minority colleges and universities can go green -- and we have the personal stories and survey results to prove it. The Building Green initiative, a Kresge Foundation-funded program of the UNCF Institute for Capacity Building, has surveyed colleges and universities that serve large percentages of minority students, and bringing them together in "learning institutes" around the country to celebrate successes and take stock of what needs to be done so that all minority-serving college campuses can become environmentally sustainable. The initiative is a partnership of UNCF, the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities, the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, and Second Nature Campus Green Builder.