Institute for the Built Environment receives Catalyst Award

Campus Crest Communities, a publically traded developer of campus student housing, awarded the Institute for the Built Environment based in the College of Applied Human Sciences at Colorado State University, with the Catalyst Award at its annual meeting.  Campus Crest is based in Charlotte, North Carolina, and since 2007 has built more than 30 student communities at universities across the country.  In recognizing IBE, the CEOs of Campus Crest, Michael Hartnett and Ted Rollins, acknowledged the transformation that is taking place within the 500-employee company.  Hartnett and Rollins recounted how the transformation began – while they were in the planning process for their project near the Colorado StateUniversity campus, a neighbor suggested that Fort Collins would be more accepting of their development if they would make it their first green community.

When asked to help them ‘green’ their Fort Collins project, Brian Dunbar and Josie Plaut, directors at IBE, required Campus Crest to agree to company-wide sustainability training, pursuit of LEED certification for their Fort Collins project, and a re-design of their prototype design to be applied at other upcoming developments. Campus Crest agreed to each condition and now plans to incorporate increasing levels of sustainable development, sustainable operations, corporate sustainability and on-going sustainability training to their employees and the more than 18,000 student residents in their communities.