New England Campus Sustainability Forum

Keynote Speakers

Anthony D. Cortese, ScD is the founding president and senior fellow of Second Nature, a nonprofit organization with a mission to develop the national capacity to make sustainability the foundation of all learning and practice in higher education. He is also a co-organizer of the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment and co-founder of theAssociation for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. He is co-founder and co-coordinator of the Higher Education Association Sustainability Consortium and a consultant to higher education, industry and non-profit organizations on institutionalization of sustainability principles and programs.

Dr. Cortese was formerly the Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection. He was the first Dean of Environmental Programs at Tufts University and founded the award-winning Tufts Environmental Literacy Institute and the internationally acclaimed Talloires Declaration of University Leaders for a Sustainable Future.

Dr. Cortese has B.S. and M.S. Degrees from Tufts University in Civil and Environmental Engineering, a Doctor of Science in Environmental Health Sciences from the Harvard School of Public Health and an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Allegheny College and the University of Maine Presque Isle.

To view Dr. Cortese’s full biography, please click here. To learn more about Second Nature, click here.

Hunter Lovins is President of Natural Capitalism Solutions. NCS helps companies, communities and countries implement more sustainable business practices profitably. Hunter has worked in countries from Afghanistan to New Zealand, and was just asked by the King of Bhutan to be an expert at a conference at the UN on reframing the economy. Over her 30 years as a sustainability thought leader, Hunter has written hundreds of articles and 13 books. The latest, The Way Out: Kickstarting Capitalism to Save Our Economic Ass (2012), is a sequel to her international best-selling book, Natural Capitalism, now in use in hundreds of college courses. A founder of the field of Sustainable Management, Hunter has helped create several MBA programs and currently teaches Sustainable Business at Bainbridge Graduate Institute in Washington State, the University of Denver and Bard College. Hunter has won dozens of awards, including the European Sustainability Pioneer award, the Right livelihood Prize (the alternative Nobel) and this year the Rachel Carson Award. Time Magazine recognized her as a Millennium Hero for the Planet, and Newsweek called her the Green Business Icon. Hunter rides rodeo and is a member of the Boulder County Sheriff’s Mounted Search and Rescue Patrol.

To view Hunter Lovin’s full biography, please click here. To visit her website, click here.

Presidents

David Hales has been President and CEO of Second Nature, the Boston-based advocacy organization committed to promoting sustainability through higher education since August, 2012. Prior to assuming this post, Hales was President of College of the Atlantic. Under his leadership, College of the Atlantic received recognition for innovative academic excellence, and became the first institution of higher education in the United States to be a “NetZero” emitter of greenhouse gases. President Hales has held numerous positions promoting sustainability nationally and internationally, including directing environmental policy and sustainability programs of the United States Agency for International Development throughout the Clinton administration.

Mark W. Huddleston of the University of New Hampshire is proud to lead efforts that build on UNH’s national reputation as a sustainability leader in higher education.

Since joining UNH in 2007, President Huddleston has been an outspoken advocate for incorporating sustainability into all aspects of campus life, academics, research, outreach and its public-private partnerships across New Hampshire and around the world. A comprehensive 10-year strategic plan he directed makes sustainability a core value that will guide a “re-imagining” of UNH.

UNH is home to the oldest endowed sustainability program in U.S. higher education and supports the UNH Sustainability Institute.

Today, UNH is rated among the top “coolest schools” in the nation. Its Durham campus generates up to 85 percent of its energy needs from landfill gas. UNH also operates the first organic dairy farm at a U.S. land-grant university, emphasizes clean alternative fuels as part of a sustainable transportation strategy, supports sustainability research across academic disciplines, and promotes locally grown foods and resource conservation. Recently, a group of business professionals were the first to complete the new UNH Certificate in Corporate Sustainability program.President Huddleston earned his bachelor’s degree in political science from the State University of New York-Buffalo, and both a master’s degree and Ph.D. in political science from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Gloria Cordes Larson, JD, joined Bentley University as its president in July 2007 after a prestigious career as an attorney, public policy expert, and business leader. She came to Bentley from her position as co-Chair of the Government Strategies Group at Foley Hoag LLP. Prior to her life in private law practice, Larson worked in the public sector for several decades, serving as Secretary of Economic Affairs under Massachusetts Governor William Weld, and Deputy Director of Consumer Protection at the Federal Trade Commission. She serves as a director of Unum Group, chairing Unum's Regulatory Compliance Committee. Ms. Larson is also a director of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts, where she is Vice Chair of the Board, and serves as President of the Massachusetts Conference for Women and the Massachusetts Women’s Forum.

Dr. Zorica Pantić has been an academic entrepreneur, technology advocate, agent for change, and a champion for diversity, making a positive impact at regional, state, and national levels. As Wentworth’s first female president and the first female engineer to lead a higher education institution of technology in the United States, she was instrumental in implementing 6 new undergraduate engineering programs (biomedical, civil, computer, electrical, mechanical, and interdisciplinary engineering) as well as an applied math program. Under her leadership, Wentworth became a graduate level institution by starting its first 3 master’s level programs (architecture, construction management, and facilities management). The campus has experienced a tremendous growth and just opened a new Center for Sciences and Biomedical Engineering and the Flanagan Campus Center. Over the 7 years of Dr. Pantić’s tenure, the Institute has become a leader in engineering, technology, design, and management education.

Dr. Robert Pura, Ph.D., has 34 years' experience as a teacher and administrator in the Massachusetts Community College System; he has spent the past twelve as President of Greenfield Community College, and is also a proud graduate of a community college. As the first in his family to attend college and the child of an immigrant, he understands what a community college education can mean to students. “Opening the doors to higher education to all who aspire to a better life for themselves and their families while at the same time maintaining high academic standards is the noblest mission in higher education.”

Len Schlesinger became President of Babson College in 2008 after serving as Vice Chairman and COO of Limited Brands. He spent over 20 years teaching at Harvard Business School, where he led MBA and executive education programs and was architect and chair of Harvard Business School’s MBA Essential Skills and Foundations programs. He is author or co-author of eleven books, including Just Start: Take action, Embrace uncertainty, Create the future. At Babson, he has led a strategy to broaden methods for teaching entrepreneurship--Entrepreneurial Thought & Action®--extending the context through Entrepreneurship of All Kinds®, and taking Babson’s pedagogy to the world. In 2011, the Historically Black Colleges and Universities named him the Most Entrepreneurial University President in the U.S.

Concurrent Session Speakers

Kate Anderson, Director of Education, Beyond Benign
Jenn Andrews, Director of Program Planning and Coordination, Clean Air-Cool Planet
Bonny Bentzin, Director of Sustainability, GreenerU,
Jack Byrne, Director of Sustainability Integration, Middlebury College
Antje Danielson, Administrative Director, Tufts University Institute of the Environment
James DeLaura, Chair of Technology and Engineering Education Department, Central Connecticut State University
Shela Fletcher, Senior Manager, Office Depot
Gabriella Gobiel, Environmental Studies Major, Stonehill College
Melissa Goodall, Assistant Director of the Office of Sustainability, Yale University
Fenna Hanes, Director of Professional and Resource Development, New England Board of Higher Education
Mary Jensen, Campus Sustainability Officer, Keene State College
Rosi Kerr, Director of Sustainability, Dartmouth College
David Kopans, Cofounder and Chief Financial Officer, GreenerU
Bill Leahy, The Institute for Sustainable Energy, Eastern State Connecticut State College
Paul Ligon, Vice President, Casella Resource Solutions
Michele Madia, Director of Sustainability Financing and Strategy, Second Nature
Libby Mahaffy, Communications Specialist, Tufts Institute of the Environment
Susan Mooney, Associate Professor of Biology and Environmental Studies Program Director, Stonehill College
Mark Orlowski, Founder & Executive Director, Sustainable Endowments Institute
Chris Powell, Director of Sustainable Energy and Environmental Initiatives, Brown University
Dallase Scott, Sustainability Program Manager, GreenerU
Susan Sloan-Rossiter, Senior Project Manager, Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc.
Ezra Small, Sustainability Manager, UMassAmherst
Michael Stoddard, Executive Director, Efficiency Maine
Josh Stoffel, Manager of Sustainability, Connecticut College
Kurt Teichert, Lecturer in Environmental Studies and Manager of Environmnetal Stewardship Initiatives, Brown University
Ed Terceiro, Executive Vice President Emeritus and Resident Engineer, Mount Wachusett Community College