A Conservationist Hopes to Lead a SUNY Campus to Sustainability

The State University of New York at Stony Brook has hired Mary C. Pearl to be the new dean of its two-year-old Southampton campus, which will focus on sustainability, both in operations and curriculum. Ms. Pearl is a noted conservationist and biologist, having served as president of Wildlife Trust, an organization of scientists promoting conservation.

An article in Newsday says that the hiring of Ms. Pearl is an effort to bring credibility to the nascent sustainability program at Southampton, which the article says hopes to double its enrollment—to nearly 600—by September. Ms. Pearl believes that the campus’s focus on sustainability will be especially relevant given the Obama administration’s focus on “green jobs.”

Julian Keniry, a prominent campus-sustainability advocate with the National Wildlife Federation, praised Southampton’s new direction in a separate essay for Newsday. “It’s an impressive model,” she wrote, “especially when you consider how little is happening on many other campuses.”