Which College is the 'Coolest' in America?

University of Washington, in Seattle WA won top honors as the Coolest School in the US, in Sierra magazine's fifth annual ranking.

The ranking "salutes the efforts of US colleges that help solve climate issues and operate sustainably.

U. Washington ranked #1 because of its "true commitment to greening its campus and providing students and faculty with departments and programs that focus on environmental responsibility."

The university provides leadership through its Center for Sustainable Forestry at Pack Forest, the Alaska Salmon Program, and the Center for Ecogenetics and Environmental Health.

Sierra Mag's feature story shows the many and varied ways colleges are addressing sustainability, from UC Irvine's energy-efficiency standards to Stanford's commitment to maintaining undeveloped open space to Green Mountain College sourcing nearly half of its energy from cow manure.

And schools of all sizes are taking dramatic action - from the University of Washington, with 40,000 students, to the Maine's College of the Atlantic, with only 321.

It's interesting that all the schools on the list are from the west and east coasts.

The top 20 schools for 2011 are:

1. University of Washington (Seattle, WA)
2. Green Mountain College (Poultney, VT)
3. University of California, San Diego (San Diego, CA)
4. Warren Wilson College (Asheville, NC)
5. Stanford University (Stanford, CA)
6. University of California, Irvine (Irvine, CA)
7. University of California, Santa Cruz (Santa Cruz, CA)
8. University of California, Davis (Davis, CA)
9. Evergreen State College (Olympia, WA)
10. Middlebury College (Middlebury, VT)
11. University of New Hampshire (Durham, NH)
12. Appalachian State University (Boone, NC)
13. Colby College (Waterville, ME)
14. Western Washington University (Bellingham, WA)
15. University of California, Los Angeles (Los Angeles, CA)
16. University of Connecticut (Storrs, CT)
17. Clark University (Worcester, MA)
18. Cornell University (Ithaca, NY)
19. Bowdoin College (Brunswick, ME)
20. University of Maryland (College Park, MD)

64% of prospective college students take a university's commitment to environmental issues into consideration when deciding where to apply and enroll, according to a 2010 Princeton Review report.

See the complete rankings, with comprehensive descriptions of each school's environmental efforts: