Claremont, Calif. (June 5, 2017)—Pitzer College, home to the Robert Redford Conservancy for Southern California Sustainability and one of the nation’s first colleges to offer an environmental studies curriculum, has declared its intent to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement. Pitzer President Melvin L. Oliver signed the “We Are Still In” pledge to support the goal of the international agreement to unite nations of the world in efforts to combat climate change.
The pledge’s ever-growing list of signatories includes over 180 college and university presidents, some of the country’s most populous states and cities, and national business leaders. In an open letter to the international community, the signatories say that they “are joining forces for the first time to declare that we will continue to support climate action to meet the Paris Agreement.” Earlier this month, President Donald Trump announced that the US will withdraw from the Paris climate accord.
Pitzer has promoted environmental awareness for more than 50 years. In 2014, the College became the first higher education institution in Southern California to divest its endowment of fossil fuel stocks. The decision was part of Pitzer’s breakthrough Fossil Fuel Divestment-Climate Action Model, which included a 25 percent reduction of the College’s carbon footprint in two years and the development of an environmental, social and governance policy to guide endowment investment decisions.
Pitzer researches, teaches and lives its commitment to sustainability. Year after year, the College is recognized nationally for its sustainability practices; in 2014, Pitzer was dubbed the “Greenest College campus” in California.
Orchestrated by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Paris Agreement seeks to keep the rise in global temperature below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and allows countries to set their own emission reduction targets and strategies.
Pitzer College is a top-ranked undergraduate liberal arts institution and a national leader in student Fulbright Fellowships. A member of The Claremont Colleges, Pitzer offers a distinctive approach to a liberal arts education by linking intellectual inquiry with interdisciplinary studies, cultural immersion, social responsibility and community involvement. For more information, please visit www.pitzer.edu.
