Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

For Noelle Studer, it was easy being green

Photos and story by James Hill

Noelle Studer’s two-and-a-half year tenure at PCC has ended. But what a two-and-a-half years it was.

Studer, who worked as the college’s sustainability coordinator, accepted a position to become Portland State University’s Facilities and Planning Sustainability Coordinator in January. She is responsible for measuring and reporting PSU’s resource consumption performance, launching conservation programs, managing the waste contract, coaching the Recycling Coordinator who manages the PSU Recycles! Program and participating on project teams for various green building capital projects. Even though she has left, her imprint on everything green at the college will last for a long time.

“Many of us refer to Noelle as the energizer bunny with a smile,” said Katherine Persson, Rock Creek Campus president. “In just three short years, Noelle started and developed the college district’s sustainability program to the point of being an integral part of the college community.”

Her biggest triumphs included the Board of Director’s adoption of the Sustainable Use of Resources Policy. This was coupled with District President Preston Pulliams’ participation with the Climate-Energy Leadership Taskforce, which advises him on how to reduce PCC’s greenhouse gas emissions and work environmental literacy into curricula. And on the horizon, she helped nurture the college’s involvement in regional economic development where companies get workers trained in green practices at PCC’s campuses.

“Creating my position was a big gamble and no one really had a good idea about what would come of bringing me onboard,” Studer said. “PCC’s executive leadership started to understand our social responsibility to walk our talk, report environmental performance, and make investments to bring PCC up to speed with other large institutions in the region.”

Studer provided leadership for the development of individual campus Green Teams, shepherded the college through one National Science Foundation grant to infuse sustainability into several program areas, helped write a second NSF grant to further sustainability curriculum development, convinced Pulliams and the Cabinet to join the College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment, helped the college address energy efficiency and waste reduction initiatives, hosted many internal and external forums about sustainability, mentored and coordinated campus sustainability student leaders and AmeriCorps staff, and got PCC recognized as a force on sustainable practices at the regional level.

“It’s been a real pleasure to serve PCC and build it’s foundation for sustainable operations and academics,” Studer said. “Because my work has been so diverse and spread throughout the district, I have a range of highlights from the past three years. The common thread is encouraging students and employees to find hope and create a livable future together. PCC is a commuter campus, so anything that brings people together for meaningful collaboration is a major step in the right direction. Launching the Paper Reduction Challenge by bringing divisions together to reduce paper consumption was definitely a milestone for PCC’s Sustainability Initiative.”

At Rock Creek, her favorite memory was watching Dale Hanson, physical plant manager, and a group of staff re-group waste containers so that recycling and trash was all together in stations. When they were suddenly short-staffed hours before the event was to start, Rock Creek pulled together and helped reorganized signage in two hours to make the recycling event a success.

Other proud moments include Cascade’s Green Team promoting a project to keep food and trash out of classrooms in Terrell Hall and developing a video short, “Dude, where’s my trash can?” At Sylvania, her favorite memory was helping faculty from architectural design, interior design, engineering, biology, sociology, literature, philosophy, and other departments encourage students to adopt green teaching concepts. And at Southeast Center’s Adult Basic Skills program she helped them to start teaching English through environmental literacy and civic engagement. This is pioneering work in the Portland area where ethnic minority groups rarely have access to environmental education, she said.

“Plus, the Community Education staff members have done an outstanding job of creating sustainable living courses to match our region’s keen interest in this area,” Studer added. “I’m so happy PCC is meeting Metro Portland’s needs.”

She is a 2003 graduate of the University of Washington where she earned a master’s degree in public administration and in urban horticulture with a concentration in urban forestry. She has worked on a variety of conservation issues from soil, water, and forestry extension in West Africa and South India to recycling, green building and urban greening in the United States. Now as she ventures on to her next challenge, PCC will have her to thank in getting the college into greener pastures.

“On behalf of the Rock Creek Student Activities, I want to thank Noelle Studer for her leadership on helping PCC become a more sustainable institution,” said Mandy Ellertson, student leadership coordinator at Rock Creek. “With her guidance and support, the college is moving in the right direction. Her help in advising the student leadership programs has been invaluable.”