Office of Sustainability en route for closure amid firing of student workers and climate change cynic among UNO administration

This article was featured in our latest print edition, which was released on Dec. 9. Pick up a copy at almost any building on either campus or check out our e-edition under the tab above. 

The two student workers making up the Office of Sustainability at the University of Nebraska at Omaha were fired in late September, leading to questions surrounding the prioritization of sustainability amid a rapidly heating earth and an increasingly concerned student body.

Born in 2015, the Office of Sustainability has worked to bring awareness for and identify, implement and assess sustainability practices across campus. Over time, the office has undergone several department transitions, leadership uncertainties and bouts of funding shortages, yet still clung to its core mission of integrating sustainability into every aspect of UNO life. 

However, with the closure of its parent department, the Diversity, Equity, Access and Inclusion (DEAI) Office in February, the sustainability office underwent another chaotic transition that will likely lead to its final demise…or has already done so.

The two Office of Sustainability student workers were seniors Cody Friend and Kayla Wycoff. Having started out under the DEAI Office, they were moved to the Office of Engagement in March with the Associate Director of Engagement, Jason Jones, as their supervisor. They adjourned for the summer feeling hopeful, but when fall semester started, their positions were in peril once more when no one renewed their student worker status.

After receiving an email from Jones stating their separation date was Tuesday, Sept. 30, the workers were told a small team would decide where the office went from that point forward, and they were cut off from all future updates.

“It felt like we were shut out [by] having our positions taken away like that [and] having no say in what happens to the office, when we were the ones behind the scenes running it,” Wycoff said. “…It just shows what the university’s priorities are right now.”

Upon The Gateway’s inquiry, a UNO spokesman, Sam Peshek, supplied the university’s response.

“The Office of Sustainability currently operates within the Office of Engagement, but there are currently no employees,” Peshek said. “The Office of Engagement and other campus units continue to support sustainability-related activities across campus.”

Friend started at the office in January of 2023, working mostly on a campus Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating system (STARS), meant to measure campus sustainability performances. Wycoff started in August of 2024, mainly working on the implementation of the Hefty ReNew Program in campus buildings and dorms, giving a second life to hard-to-recycle plastics.

Wycoff said she and Friend “did what we could with what we had.” She spoke of her hope for the position and the reality that accompanied it.

“It made me feel like I was doing something important and changing the university for the better, especially doing the Hefty program,” Wycoff said. “It was frustrating when the office shut down for the first and the second time. It was disheartening and made me feel like my voice wasn’t heard and all our voices who are involved with sustainability [weren’t heard].”

Friend mentioned an overall lack of support from administration throughout their time in the office.

“I was just a work study student hired to do this job, and it felt like I was almost a bother,” Friend said. “…And as a freshman, I was thinking, ‘Everyone’s connected, everyone wants to help, everyone has the best intentions,’ and then I got the feeling that sustainability wasn’t necessarily as important to everyone else on campus.”

He recounted a moment when meeting with the Assistant Vice Chancellor for Facilities Management and Planning, Larry Morgan, about the campus sustainability report, when Morgan said, “if administration or the NU system wanted to get this done, they would get it done.”

“I’ve been thinking about that ever since the office closed,” Friend said. “If the NU system wanted there to be more sustainability, it would happen. They’ve been able to acquire anything they want, like a new stadium, but they can’t seem to acquire a sustainability office at UNO?”

Now, there is no one left to take up the mantle, and no official support for the one sustainability club left standing at UNO.

Looking back into the office’s history, a very similar situation occurred just a few years prior in 2022.

For the first seven years of its existence, the Office of Sustainability was headed by a sustainability coordinator, a full-time staff member whose core mission was to implement sustainable practices on campus. From 2019-2022, that person was Kristina Hughes.

Operating under Student Resources, Hughes led a team of three student workers who split their duties among composting and data collection, upkeeping the community garden and general sustainability communications.

One of the student workers was Zoe Miller, who worked at the office from 2021 to 2023. Miller said her advocacy stemmed from her position within the office as she learned to stand up for herself, her co-workers and sustainability in general.

While the office was able to instill tangible impacts among students, Hughes said she had “nobody on campus” that was responsive to helping her “progress things forward.”

“When I was here, I provided student opportunities,” Hughes said. “So, I think the impact for students that wanted to get involved and wanted to have a place [on campus] was big, but what we actually impacted as far as the university and its function, was very small.”

In 2022, the university dissolved the Office of Student Resources and moved the sustainability office under a different department with a new UNO administrator as their supervisor. Although Hughes said the move made sense “on paper,” there was a “disconnect in philosophies” between the sustainability office and its new parent organization.

“[It] was going to be very much bottom line on budget and money savings where sustainability oftentimes, is really an investment, it’s going to take resources,” Hughes said.

Additionally, a student worker uncovered past Facebook posts from the campus administrator put in charge of the office, causing the sustainability team to worry about their ability to function on campus.

One such post was shared by Morgan in 2017 which depicted him ridiculing the “Liberal agenda” with a link to a story that uncovered an alleged “Liberal climate change scam.”

One such post was shared by the office’s new supervisor in 2017 which depicted them calling out the “Liberal agenda” with a link to a story that uncovered an alleged “Liberal Climate Change Scam.”

“[His] views on sustainability and climate change were directly in opposition to the drivers of what the office’s purpose on the campus was,” Hughes said. “I could see that being challenging to overcome for the Office of Sustainability to meet its mission on helping the campus become more sustainable.”

According to Miller, the student who uncovered the information was Zee Elmer, who was also the president of the campus’ sustainability club, Sustain UNO, at the time. Allegedly, Miller said Elmer was given an ultimatum by the Dean of Students, Cathy Pettid, after rumors of them “not getting along” with the supervisor.

Reportedly, Pettid told Elmer to resign from their sustainability positions, or they would face consequences such as scholarship denials or not being able to graduate.

“I just heard it from this person after it had happened,” Miller said. “So, I think hearing that as a sophomore on campus, I was like ‘Oh shoot, I don’t trust these people.’”

The Gateway was unable to reach Elmer for comment and Pettid directed all questions to Peshek, the UNO spokesman. Neither Pettid nor Peshek answered questions about plans for the office’s future.

However, after only a brief period functioning under the new office, Hughes had to step down from the Office of Sustainability due to her mother being diagnosed with cancer.

“I had requested that I continue to work remotely while I take my mom to the cancer center and she gets chemo,” Hughes said. “And I wasn’t given that opportunity. So, I either had to choose to take care of my mom or choose to keep my job, and it was a very easy choice to make.”

Following Hughes’ departure, the sustainability office was moved under the DEAI office and left to function without a sustainability coordinator.

Hughes mirrored Friend’s statement towards UNO’s outlook on sustainability, saying, “If they did value it and they did want to see it on campus, they would have replaced me.”

In its state today, the Office of Sustainability is non-functioning with its two student workers fired and no apparent efforts to revive it. To Miller, watching her work circle the drain “sucks to see.”

“I would hope that one day administration can make sustainability a priority,” Miller said. “Climate change is such an important issue and young people are going to experience that for the rest of our lives. We have been given this problem to fix, unfortunately.”

Regarding the future of the office, most of the sustainability workers, past and present, agreed that students and administration need to work together. In their dream scenario, students would be the voice, and administration would be the support.

“I do think that students have a lot of influence and power,” Hughes said. “So, if it is being driven by students to bring it back, I do think it has a chance, because I’ve seen students do incredible things.”

After 10 years of sustainability advocacy on the UNO campus, is the Office of Sustainability set to meet its end?

*The writer of this story is an Environmental Science major and the current president of Sustain UNO, a separate sustainability entity at UNO.