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September 10, 2008, 02:52 PM ET
Portland State U. Gets $25-Million for Sustainability Education and Research
Portland State University has won a $25-million grant from the James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation to be used for research and education on sustainability. The gift is the largest in the university’s history.
Wim Wiewel, who arrived as president of the Oregon institution three weeks ago, said the grant presented both big opportunities and big challenges: It requires the university to raise another $25-million toward sustainability programs within the next 10 years.
The foundation had been interested in giving Portland State the money, he said, but it was the university that made sustainability the chosen field. Last year, during an academic strategic-planning process, before university officials knew anything about such a gift, they and faculty members had “identified sustainability as a lead area where we wanted to be known,” Mr. Wiewel said.
Mr. Wiewel, whose work has been large in urban planning, and who has written about town-gown relationships, says the focus on sustainability will help Portland State form a stronger connection to its city.
A Portland State news release said the university identifies four areas of sustainability education: “the integration of human societies and the natural environment, creating sustainable urban communities, implementing sustainability and mechanisms of change, and measuring sustainability.”
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