EcoLeague

St. Lawrence University in Canton, NY, recently joined the EcoLeague, a consortium of liberal arts colleges and universities dedicated to ecologically focused education and research as well as modeling sustainability through their operations and facilities.

Currently coordinated by Dickinson College in Pennsylvania, the EcoLeague consortium includes colleges and universities across the United States: Alaska Pacific University in Anchorage, AK; College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, ME; Dickinson College in Carlisle, PA; New College of Florida in Sarasota, FL; and Prescott College in Prescott, AZ.

Neil Leary, Director of Dickinson College’s Center for Sustainability Education: “St. Lawrence University is an excellent fit for the EcoLeague consortium. As an exceptional liberal arts college with strengths in experiential and environmental education, they offer students at all the member colleges opportunities for high-impact learning through the EcoLeague student exchange program. We look forward to sending our students to study at St Lawrence and eagerly await welcoming their students on our campuses.”

St. Lawrence University has long offered a wide array of environmentally themed courses across the disciplines, outdoor leadership experiences, and unique experiential learning opportunities focused on the North Country region of New York, including the Adirondacks and the St. Lawrence watershed, as well as east Africa (through the Kenya Semester Program or shorter-term summer courses), and the neotropics.

St. Lawrence recently inaugurated the Center for the Environment, which seeks to empower the next generation of leaders to develop the skills necessary—through education, advocacy, and action—to be agents of change in their communities, the region, and the world. The university has an environmental literacy requirement for all students, and there are over 70 courses across the curriculum designed to meet the associated learning goals. Many first-year program offerings focus on topics of sustainability or environmental justice. With the launch of the Center for the Environment in 2024 as a major component of the institution’s strategic framework, it is the university’s goal to provide expanded skills-based, leadership and career-focused opportunities related to the environment, and to further develop and leverage robust connections to alumni and employers in environment-related fields – on and off campus.

Dr. Diane Husic, Director of St. Lawrence University’s Center for the Environment: “I have long been a proponent of collaborations and, thus, I am delighted about St. Lawrence joining the EcoLeague. This will provide exciting opportunities for St. Lawrence students and faculty to learn from others and to forge new scholarly partnerships.”

St. Lawrence completed a robust application process that included a report documenting its academic programs and commitment to sustainability and several conversations with current EcoLeague leadership and members.

St. Lawrence’s participation adds new experiences for their students and faculty and enhances the current consortium’s offerings for students, faculty, staff, and administrators. 

Dr. Diane Husic, Director of St. Lawrence University’s Center for the Environment: “St. Lawrence students boldly seek opportunities for off-campus study and the student exchange component of the EcoLeague will provide them with new choices to study in a range of ecosystems across the country. We are also excited to welcome students from other consortium institutions to participate in experiential-learning opportunities in the wonderful North Country.”

St. Lawrence’s 1,000-acre campus includes the Living Lab property and Wachtmeister Field Station, which are adjacent to the main campus. The university runs an Adirondack Semester at a Yurt Village within the Adirondacks and owns the Canaras Conference Center – a historical lodge and cabins on Saranac Lake. Students throughout the EcoLeague will have easy access to the vast Adirondack Park, which includes glacial-carved geology, high peaks, the largest contiguous forest east of the Mississippi, more than 2,000 miles of hiking trails, over 3,000 lakes and ponds, and 1,200 miles of rivers. The St. Lawrence Seaway is about 30 minutes away from campus and is connected to the town of Canton via the Grasse River. St. Lawrence also owns a compound in Nairobi used for the Kenya Semester Program and summer courses which would be open to EcoLeague students.

Brady McCartney, Consortium Director of the EcoLeague: “I am excited to welcome St. Lawrence University to the EcoLeague as the consortium begins its third decade of leading environmental and sustainability education efforts in bioregions throughout the U.S. St. Lawrence has a demonstrated commitment to understanding and addressing environmental and sustainability challenges by threading environmental literacy throughout the curriculum and providing its students with outdoor education, green internship fellowships, and innovation grants opportunities. The EcoLeague consortium and our member colleges will benefit greatly from our new partnership with St. Lawrence’s students, faculty, staff, and administrators inside and outside of the classroom.”