Since the Fall of 2024, Whitman has been without a Sustainability Manager — a crucial role that coordinates student, faculty and administrative collaboration on sustainability projects and concerns. The role, previously held by Sarah Williams, has been difficult to fill.
Jeff Hamrick, the Vice President for Finance and Administration at Whitman, openly shared his thoughts on why the position remains vacant. According to him, it simply may not be an appealing offer for many applicants.
“It tends to be the kind of position that attracts someone in their mid-20s who may be between a college degree and getting a master’s degree. I would love to find someone who wants to live out their adult life here and do this job for 20 years, but that is probably a pipe dream. […] It’s very unusual for one [job position] to take even three months to fill. This is an unusual situation,” Hamrick said.
The absence of a Sustainability Manager has made life difficult for those involved in sustainability at Whitman, leaving unanswered questions about who will take on key responsibilities.
Chair of Physics, Kurt Hoffman, is on PSAC, the President’s Sustainability Advisory Committee. The committee is a united group of faculty, students and administration. They are supposed to meet, discuss and vote on various sustainability projects and proposals.
Hoffman explained that the lack of a Sustainability Manager has hindered PSAC’s productivity.
“We haven’t met recently. This is primarily because we no longer have a Sustainability Manager, someone who organized meetings and kept everything operating. It’s been a challenge to schedule meetings. It takes time and effort, and since nobody has that as a priority, it hasn’t been happening. […] People are sincere in their interest [in sustainability], but it’s taking a backseat,” Hoffman said. “With the loss of that position, we’ve been left with a vacuum. We are a little rudderless.”
Students share a similar frustration over the lack of communication between different parties. It has made scheduling anticipated meetings very difficult — meetings that are often the only way for students to connect with administration to discuss concerns and proposals.
Aurora Ortega is the ASWC Sustainability Chair and a member of PSAC. The role of the ASWC Sustainability Committee is to serve as a liaison between student groups and administration, receiving student inquiries and forwarding them to the administration. Typically, they are the only student group guaranteed interaction with the administration and, therefore, are a crucial link between students and administrative departments.
“Our work is very project-based. We mainly bring up project ideas to Juli Dunn, Wendy Angus and other faculty advisors for ASWC,” said Ortega.
Ortega was on the Committee back when Whitman still had a Sustainability Manager and has experienced the negative impacts of losing the position firsthand.
“You have to go through more people, as opposed to speaking to one person [the Sustainability Manager]. […] There just hasn’t been a single bit of communication, even with scheduling. Students have offered to figure that out for the administration, but it’s hard when you don’t have all the information you need. I’ve proposed a couple of projects in Facilities that I’ve been told would happen, and I’ve not heard a single thing back. If we aren’t going to do [the projects], then I need to know so that I can move forward with different projects,” said Ortega.
Being Whitman’s Sustainability Manager doesn’t boast a competitive salary for its job description. Compared with other Eastern Washington employers, such as state and local governments, the Army Corps of Engineers and other Walla Walla schools, Hamrick says Whitman just can’t compete.
“I would love to make [the job position] market competitive. We’re in the middle of significant budgetary constraints and are not likely to be allocated additional compensation dollars by the president’s cabinet. Setting aside rumors, I don’t have the power to do that,” Hamrick said.
Normally, the Sustainability Manager serves as an essential point of communication between students and administration. They would understand the financial limitations and the strain on Facilities while continuing to be an advocate for student voices. They are meant to be a resource for information about all sustainability happenings on campus.
Aidan Tribolet, a senior and a member of the Climate Justice Coalition on campus, shared their thoughts on the disconnect between what students believe is possible sustainability-wise, versus the reality of the work that makes it happen.
“It’s really important to recognize that students don’t see a lot of the labor that’s going on. They aren’t meant to. We don’t see major tree removals or that sort of work. It happens when students are off campus during breaks,” Tribolet said. “When students have certain demands like xeriscaping the campus, there is not always the recognition that it’s an incredible demand on a really small group.”
Tribolet also thinks the lack of urgency around sustainability may partly stem from the broader cultural trend of dismissing environmental issues as low priorities.
“The issue is that Whitman is overburdened, and sustainability and environmental issues then become what is always being pushed into the future. The problem is, how far can we push these things into the future? What place does that take us to?” Tribolet said.
Regarding Whitman’s job posting for a Sustainability Manager, Tribolet agreed with Kurt Hoffman and said they think Whitman’s administration could make some changes to the posting.
“Kurt has spoken about amending the language of the job description to make Whitman’s Sustainability Department seem like a place where someone can come in and make more meaningful changes than simply managing existing programs,” Tribolet said.
Besides changing the job posting to include a more robust vision for the position, the question of what to do in the meantime remains. There are still many student sustainability groups on campus who are eager to begin planning and executing projects. Kurt Hoffman is hopeful that things will begin to pick up soon.
“In terms of PSAC, there is a lot of interest and energy in seeing progress on infrastructure in the future. So, most of the people involved [in PSAC] are interested in getting things done and seeing them happen,” said Hoffman.
He is pushing for PSAC to have its first meeting sometime in December.
Jeff Hamrick, on the other hand, seemed concerned about leaving people with too-high expectations.
“I’ll be the first person to admit that the ball has been dropped and meetings are not being held as frequently as they ought to. Frankly, we are on hold in several respects. Our momentum is stalled until we get that position filled,” Hamrick said.
Tribolet seemed to share similar sentiments while also reflecting on what they hope to see, regardless of whether Whitman hires a new Sustainability Manager. He mentioned that more transparency from the administration about their plans and budget constraints would help manage student expectations while also holding Whitman accountable for its environmental footprint.
“The school is doing some reorganization of its documents so that policies are more clearly laid out. The enumeration of clear policies is helpful because it gives us a better sense of how the school wants everything to operate and its expectations for those operations. More transparency would be good related to financial things and compliance with environmental regulations,” said Tribolet.
Hoffman also emphasized the importance of having clarity between Whitman and its students. To him, the Sustainability Manager is the path to bridging the communication gap.
“It’s not clear who to contact at the moment without a Sustainability Manager. My sense is that’s probably a barrier for students. At this point, it is unclear how things can move forward without a Sustainability Manager there to help shepherd things along,” said Hoffman. “It’s a void in the system when we don’t have someone to focus on sustainability topics more exclusively, and have to instead distribute responsibilities among many different people.”
Ultimately, as Hoffman remarked, without a Sustainability Manager, there is uncertainty among students, faculty and administration about how things will proceed. Students may make demands for change, but without a designated person to hear them, sustainability efforts may continue to chug along at a slow pace.
