Hope College prides itself in a beautiful campus environment that encourages the community to connect with nature. One of the most valuable assets to encourage this relationship is our trees.

“He who plants a tree plants hope.”
—Lucy Larcom

Why are trees important?

Trees provide benefits to humans (ecosystem services):

  • Mitigate droughts and floods
  • Climate stability
  • Purify air and water
  • Aesthetic value
  • Wildlife habitat
  • Noise reduction

“Trees are a solution to some of the greatest issues we face, including climate change. Around the globe, trees lead to a healthier environment, economy, and society.”
—Arbor Day Foundation, Tree Campus Higher Education.

Our goal is to bring students and stakeholders together, so they can be prepared as Christian stewards and responsible global citizens. We engage the world constructively through our teaching, research and community service in order to shape Hope College into a model of sustainability and to be a force for good in the world.

As urbanization rapidly replaces natural forest cover, urban forests are becoming increasingly important because of the ecosystem services they provide. This website highlights some of our active projects related to learning more about the benefits of trees and can be used as a tool for our campus community as well as the greater Holland area.

TREE CAMPUS USA RECOGNITION
Hope College has been honored with Tree Campus USA® recognition since 2018. A campus with this status is regarded for fostering considerable community and campus involvement in maintaining urban forests and having effective management of campus trees.
ArbNet Accreditation

In spring 2026 Hope College was recognized as a Level 2 Arboretum. This is a testament to the care our grounds team provides to our campus and our strong partnership with the City of Holland in caring for our urban forest.

Level II accreditation is awarded to arboreta with at least 100 labeled species or taxa of trees and other woody plants in their collections, and a clear commitment to public education and collections management. 

This accreditation recognizes institutions with growing capacity and outreach programs, as well as signage or interpretation. It is a notable achievement for tree-focused organizations.

To qualify at Level II, an arboretum must demonstrate more advanced planning with more detailed documentation, and show that it has a structured approach to plant curation and public engagement.

About this Certification
An arboretum is a living museum of trees and woody plants, grown and cared for by an organization committed to their stewardship.

Arboreta serve not only as beautiful places to explore and enjoy, but can also provide vital community resources for personal wellness, environmental education, ecological conservation and scientific research.

n April 2011, The Morton Arboretum launched ArbNet and arbnet.org, an interactive community of arboreta and tree professionals designed to support the common purposes and interests of tree-focused public gardens. The Arboretum Accreditation Program was established through ArbNet at the same time to provide specific standards of professional practice, and it offers four levels of accreditation. In tandem, they created the Morton Register of Arboreta — a global database of arboreta and other public gardens that have a substantial focus on woody plants.

Since its inception, ArbNet has accredited over 800 arboreta across 40 countries. In 2022, ArbNet was honored with the American Public Gardens Association Program Excellence Award. Into the next decade, ArbNet will engage its large and growing audience by continuing to support gardens in reaching their professional goals and milestones, sharing best practices and resources, improving urban forestry by supporting municipal tree collections, building capacity for smaller arboreta through grants and professional opportunities, establishing arboreta in biodiversity hotspots to facilitate conservation, supporting tree conservation efforts through partnership and networks, and, finally, supporting scientific and horticultural research in arboretum collections of all sizes.

The ArbNet program is unique and impactful, which can be seen by its global footprint and diversity of arboreta. ArbNet supports a greener, healthier and more beautiful world.

ArbNet’s founding organization, The Morton Arboretum, is an internationally recognized tree-focused botanical garden and research center. Its 1,700 acres of beautiful tree-filled landscapes are a place of enjoyment, a vibrant hub for nature education, and a world-renowned center for scientific research that studies trees and how to sustain them. As a nonprofit organization, The Morton Arboretum’s mission is to collect, study, display and conserve trees and other plants from around the world to inspire learning, foster enjoyment, benefit communities, encourage action and enhance the environment.

Arboretum Mission

The mission of the Hope College Arboretum is to provide a place of recreation, education and beauty. The arboretum serves as a living laboratory to prepare students as Christian stewards and responsible global citizens. By cultivating a diverse urban forest, we seek to mitigate climate change, provide ecosystem services and offer a place of beauty and recreation that connects the Hope and greater Holland community with the wonder of creation.

At the heart of this plan is the concept of creation care. We recognize the natural world not just as a resource, but as a gift to be tended.

  • Stewardship: To manage our canopy in a way that promotes biodiversity and ecological health.
  • Education: To prepare students as Christian stewards and responsible global citizens by using the arboretum as a living laboratory for teaching, research and community service.
  • Restoration & Well-being: To provide a sanctuary for relaxation, mental health and recreation, recognizing that a thriving canopy supports the emotional and spiritual flourishing of our students and the Holland community.
  • Witness: To act as a visible sign of the college’s commitment to sustainability and the flourishing of all life.

This plan outlines a vision for the Hope College Arboretum that weaves together botanical excellence, creation care and community engagement. By transforming our campus into a living laboratory, we honor our stewardship responsibilities while providing a sanctuary for learning.

TREESAP

TreeSap was built to allow nature enthusiasts to identify and understand the value of trees throughout the Holland, Michigan, area. Using data collected by Hope College and the City of
Holland, users can identify trees via their current location, manual coordinate entry, map and QR code. Additionally, users can add their own trees to the database and have their trees reviewed and approved by trusted curators. 

trees.cityofholland.com

  • Our research identifies and quantifies specific benefits that trees provide us
  • Allows us to make smart planting decisions based on desired benefits
  • Encourages a relationship with nature

TreeSAP Partners:

CAMPUS TREES

Hope’s campus has over 2,000 trees across our campus composed of approximately 100 different species. The structural value of these trees adds up to over $3.8 million, though the most valuable aspects of these trees are the ecosystem services they provide our community every year. 

View our campus tree inventory map. To date we have over 1,700 inventoried in our campus GIS program.

Read highlights about some of our campus trees on our index page.

NATURE PRESERVE

The Hope College Nature Preserve is a beautiful, 55-acre Beech-Maple forest located within the Western Michigan dune ecosystem. It is home to over 40 species of plants, 14 species of mammals, 40 species of birds and hundreds of species of arthropods. The preserve is located approximately five miles from our main campus and 1/4 mile from the Lake Michigan shoreline in Laketown Township, Allegan County.

The students and faculty of the Department of Biology are passionate about our responsibility to protect and manage the property wisely, both for the sake of the college’s academic program and because even small parcels of natural habitat are important repositories of biological diversity. Our species list grows yearly as we explore the property more fully. Unfortunately, it is clear that this property already suffers from many threats, and that these will become more severe as suburban development increasingly isolates the site from larger parcels of natural habitat in the future. One of our most important long-term goals is to use the nature preserve to understand how small parcels of land can best be managed for the maintenance of their biological diversity and the ecosystem services they provide.

Although the primary use of the nature preserve is for teaching and research by Hope College students and faculty, the preserve can be visited by those not affiliated with Hope College. However, because research projects are sensitive to disturbance, hunting, camping, horseback riding, off-road vehicle use, mountain biking and cross-country skiing are strictly prohibited. 

Persons interested in visiting to the property for such purposes should contact Dr. K. Greg Murray via phone at 616.395.7716 or via email at gmurray@hope.edu.

MORNINGSIDE PARK

To make reservations for Morningside Park, please contact Hope College Events and Conferences (616.395.7222).

Morningside Park is located on the corner of 32nd Street and Morningside Drive in Holland. It spans 1.6 acres and was donated to Hope College in 2007 by its former owners, Merle and Arloa Prins. The beautiful park features a gazebo (often used for weddings), a nice shed to store tools and a quaint bridge over a stream. Along the shaded paths, there are many different kinds of plants used for a variety of medicinal purposes.

HERBARIUM
Hope College Herbarium (HCHM) is located in room 3051 of the Schaap Science Center and holds about 8,000 specimens mostly from the West Michigan area with a rich collection of asteraceous plants. Our herbarium specimen images are online in the Symbio Portal.
GREENHOUSE
The 1,750 square-foot greenhouse has been a facility of the college and the biology department since 1972. It provides an environment in which experimental plants can be cultivated to allow student-faculty collaborative research, functions as a repository of a diversity of living specimens that are used in many botany and general biology courses, and provides an opportunity for the biology department to reach out to community in informal education of people of all ages.
RESEARCH POSTERS
ARTICLES

 

Interested in ANY OF OUR TREE PROJECTS?

Email Michelle Gibbs

Hope CollegeSustainability

Miller Center for Musical Arts221 Columbia AvenueRoom 233Holland, MI 49423

workP. 616.395.6811

ArbNet Accreditation Badge: Accredited Arboretum Level II

Arbor Day Foundation Tree Campus logo