118 Business View Magazine - May 2016
ergy & Environmental Design, a green building certifi-
cation program that recognizes best-in-class building
strategies and practices. To receive LEED certification,
building projects satisfy prerequisites and earn points
to achieve different levels of certification – Silver, Gold,
and Platinum.)
Key to NAU’s sustainability objectives is inculcating in
its students - especially those who live on-campus -
behaviors that will help conserve energy in dormito-
ries and buildings. Cori Cusker is NAU’s Residence Life
Sustainability Coordinator. She outlines her responsi-
bilities in carrying out that aim: “7,000 students live
on campus and that’s a pretty big impact. My charge
is to teach them how to adopt conservation-focused
behaviors that they can use on campus and then later
in life. I do that in a variety of different ways. One that
I focus on is the Eco-rep program, a group of peer edu-
cators modeled after a national model. My students
are assigned to a hall, preferably the one they live in.
We meet weekly and talk about a variety of topics. I
focus a lot on conservation and try and give them a
holistic perspective of what sustainability is – looking
at the social and community aspect of it, consumer-
ism, but also your basic behaviors of waste minimiza-
tion and water and energy conservation. I take a qua-
si-academic approach with them. We have a manual
about different topics. The students actually learn a
lot. There’s a lot of personal growth and development
that happens through participating in the Eco-rep pro-
gram. Even the students who are really knowledgeable
and excited about environmental issues when they get
here learn something new every year.”
Ellen Vaughan is the Manager of the NAU Sustainability
Office. In addition to having led the rewriting of NAU’s
Sustainability Action Plan, she oversees Green NAU,
the school’s centralized, online information center, a
Students at NAU table regularly to inform their peers about sustainable living practices.
