Thermal Comfort in a Classroom: Sustainable Management for a Campus

Despite the vast research in sustainability, very little is known about providing “sustainable management” strategies for a student at a university. The motivation for this study is to examine one of the best strategies and techniques to advance a sustainable management strategy for a campus. Establishing sustainable management strategies can increase students’ well-being and performance. This study was conducted at Morgan State University (MSU) in the Center for the Built Environment and Infrastructure Studies (CBEIS) and Mitchell/Schaefer Building. The results proved the CBEIS classroom meets the requirements of specific standards on thermal comfort and can maintain its required internal temperature and humidity for the students, whereas the classroom in the Schaefer Building without the LEED certification could not maintain its required internal temperature and humidity despite having a classroom without a student load. Both classrooms’ temperature and relative humidity in the rooms were greatly influenced by the weather outside. The major implications of the findings were that sustainable management strategy such as maintaining a prescribed comfort zone could provide economic and environmental benefits while improving the student well-being at any size university. However, any institutions interested in initiating a sustainability management strategy might benefit from undertaking them in an educational setting. This paper offers a different type of vision on how to develop a culture of sustainable management strategy and technique for any university.