Written for The Argo by Ben Dziobek

Stockton University Student Senate voted on a resolution during their meeting on Tuesday March 23rd to divest the University from fossil fuels.  This resolution passed unanimously, meaning the proposal goes to the Faculty Senate and then after that the Board of Trustees.  This resolution states that the Board of Trustees in the Stockton Foundation must divest a combined $2.15 million it has in fossil fuel sector investments.

The resolution also pushes for an administrative, faculty, and student taskforce to review the divestment process and to watch over future investments. This means students would have the ability to voice their concerns on any investments the university makes which they believe have questionable morals. In this resolution it also requests that the university apologize to the BIPOC community and the greater Stockton community for putting their future in jeopardy by investing in fossil fuels. This is a huge step for New Jersey’s Green University to hold up to its namesake. 

Rutgers University divested from fossil fuels this month.  Their proposal was years in the making with an uphill fight. If Stockton divested it would be the second University in the state to divest which could help movements at all the other colleges around the state. It would show that you don’t have to have a billion dollar endowment to make a difference. This would be a landmark decision by the Board of Trustees that would place the University within only a handful of other universities around the world if they divested from fossil fuels.

The work that went into this happening so quickly was months of dedication and research by the Stockton University Environmental Club. The group studied how other universities around the country began their divestment campaigns so the campaign at Stockton did not have to build everything from the ground up.

Organizers rallied together and bombarded administrators with their open letter which helped get things moving as it became a concern of public opinion. There is still a lot more work to go but for now, the Stockton Environmental Club is celebrating a possible divestment from fossil fuels at Stockton.