A Message from Jamie Lewis Keith

MIT is an institution renowned for creatively solving problems and answering questions, taking their full complexity into account. Addressing our responsibility to the environment, whether in our research, teaching, or operations, requires the creativity, commitment, and expertise of many people, disciplines, and perspectives. We take an integrated and comprehensive approach to environmental stewardship, which distinguishes MIT and is manifested in a host of initiatives that extend far beyond compliance with laws and regulations – from cross-disciplinary teaching and research, to designing “high performance” buildings, to recycling and energy conservation programs, to composting, to “green procurement.”

Many institutions treat their environmental activities – such as research, coursework, legal compliance, and recycling and other sustainability initiatives – as discrete and unrelated. At MIT, we view these efforts as connected and interdependent. Our new website reflects this integration by providing a clearinghouse for “everything environmental” at MIT, including research and curricula, campus environmental initiatives, and environmental, health, and safety (EHS) services. We hope our website also makes it easier to find environmental information and activities of interest, and to appreciate the connections among them.

If, as an institution, we are committed to teaching and conducting research on environmental issues at the highest standards, our operations must meet these same standards. This effort involves addressing the multitude of factors that affect our approach to the environment – both in the subjects taught and researched here, and in the work-related and individual activities carried out by our faculty, students, and staff.

Measuring our success. What we call “the environment” is a complex phenomenon involving a breadth of interests, values, and disciplines. While it is possible to measure the success of environmental initiatives through traditional quantitative methods – for example, the amount of materials we recycle or compost – these measures are not fully adequate. For that reason, MIT is implementing an innovative management system that will enable us to gauge the success of our environmental endeavors as they relate not only to statistical data, but also to the values that inform our commitment to responsible environmental stewardship.

MIT’s approach to the environment is both integrated and highly collaborative, drawing upon the skills and intelligence of committed individuals from throughout our community and beyond. Encouraging collaboration among many departments and individuals in both academic and administrative areas has enabled us to leverage our community’s extraordinary talents, scale barriers together, build mutual trust, and speed our progress toward achieving our shared environmental goals. The fruits of this collective effort, documented on this website, underscore the depth of MIT’s commitment to the environment, and reflect the advances we are bringing to light in our curriculum, research, programs, and operations.

Sincerely,
Jamie Lewis Keith
Managing Director for Environmental Programs and Risk Management, and Senior Counsel