Online college programs help save greenhouse gas emissions since students do not have to commute, and now, trees. Anaheim University, once of the first universities to add online classrooms, will eliminate paper in the classroom and administration offices by 2010. 

To do so, the university is supplying students with electronic documents, e-readers, and hard drives with plenty of storage space. The school, which links students with classmates and instructors internationally, is also demanding that book publishers provide electronic textbooks for viewing on laptops and e-readers.

Program catalogs and other administrative and office paperwork will be strictly electronic and available for downloading by students. 

The university first started accepting assignments electronically more than a decade ago, when it also made its library available online.

It won't just be class work that is paperless -- administrative forms will all be electronic with digital signatures by 2010.

Anaheim students can continue being green in their professional careers by obtaining an MBA or graduate certificate in Sustainable Management from the school.

Reducing the mass amounts of paper within a college is absolutely beneficial for the environment. However, the reduction in paper is somewhat mitigated by the electricity costs associated with running thousands of e-readers for staff and students.

 

What will be the electricity demand for scanning hundreds of documents to PDFs? If this electricity is provided by renewable energy, no harm, no foul. However, if that electricity is powered by fossil fuels, let’s hope the trees saved cover the carbon dioxide emitted from electricity consumption. 

President Dr. William Hartley recognized the importance of considering the power source in a prepared statement. "We don't want to be hypocritical by teaching our students to be sustainable while chopping down trees and wasting energy to do so. Times have changed and universities need to practice what they teach."

Anaheim is taking a remarkable first step and hopefully, can take things one-step further by using renewable energy.