Business View Magazine - September 2015

24 Business View - September 2015 Business View - September 2015 25 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 one-stop-shop for all information related to sustain- ability at the university. Her Office also coordinates the many diverse programs that help promote sustainabil- ity concepts within the confines of the NAU campus. For example, the Environmental Caucus facilitates creative and strategic communication to advance the institutional commitment to sustainability and to pro- mote education, research, and collaboration on the environment. Green Jacks, also known as the Student Environmental Caucus, seeks to create a culture of sustainability on campus via extra-curricular initiatives and programs. But Vaughan also stresses the activities that take the school’s sustainability programs beyond the campus and into the broader community: “We have quarter- ly meeting with the sustainability leaders at the city and county levels to try and see if we can have similar messaging or collaborate on purchasing,” she relates. “We also have student action groups’ whose main pur- pose is to go out into the community and help create student gardens, participate in public achievement, teach resource efficiency, etc. For example, we give a lot of our compost to the community gardens, so we’re always looking at ways to share resources.” CRAFTS – Civic Re-engagement for Arizona Families, Transi- tions and Sustainability - is a campus program whose aim is to foster sustainable communities through en- gaged learning, community partnerships, and action research with NAU. But fostering sustainability consciousness at NAU is not restricted to its students. Avi Henn is the Program Coordinator for the campus’ Energy Mentors Program. He outlines the program’s focus and genesis: “We re- cruit volunteer faculty and staff to go through training Students at NAU table regularly to inform their peers about sustainable living practices. NAU’s Yellow Bike Program gives free bikes to any interested student. clean & Green clean & Green