Investments

Goal 1: Increase awareness and adoption of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) criteria in the selection of WWU investments.

1.1 Give due consideration to ESG criteria exercised by the companies and/or funds in which University investments are made.

1.2 Make investment holdings information publicly available, including but not limited to fund performance against ESG metrics (as available).

Goal 2: Through its decision-making and communication processes, the University will ask the Foundation Board to consider including additional investment criteria, including ESG, in its selection of investments or investment managers, and communicate those decisions to the University community.

2.1 Support the Foundation in publicizing its Climate Aware Investment option to prospective donors, by the end of 2018.

2.2 Ask the Foundation Board to consider setting a goal to have a meaningful amount of endowment holdings invested in the Climate Aware Fund by June 30, 2021.

2.3 Ask the Foundation Board to consider requiring investment advisors to include ESG criteria as part of their due diligence process when hiring investment managers that may manage Foundation funds, either directly or indirectly, by the end of 2018.

2.4 Ask the Foundation Board to consider mandating that any investment advisor responding to an RFP be a signatory to (UNPRI) by the end of 2018.

2.5 By the end of 2018, ask the Foundation Board to consider inclusion in any agreement with an investment advisor that if the advisor ceases to be a signatory to UNPRI or follow those principles, the Foundation may terminate the agreement.

2.6  Ask the Foundation Board to consider, at such time as the Foundation makes investments itself, becoming a signatory to UNPRI.

Goal 3: Students understand both Western’s and the Foundation’s investment processes.

3.1 Advance educational opportunities for greater student learning in the management and oversight of endowments and sustainable investing.

3.2 Provide learning opportunities for students to evaluate the critical difference(s) between various types of sustainable investing and traditional investments.