Blue Devil of the Week: Spreading the Sustainability Message

Name: Rebecca Hoeffler

Title: Program and communications coordinator for Sustainable Duke

Years at Duke: 2

What she does: When she was in high school, two things happened that shaped Hoeffler’s view of how people should treat the world. First, Hoeffler’s mother bought her a copy of “An Inconvenient Truth,” a documentary about the dangers of global warming.

“She didn’t get it for the environmental message,” Hoeffler said. “I was thinking about going into film production and hadn’t seen many documentaries, so she thought I should see one.”

Not long after that, her younger brother was born. Thinking about the world he’d grow up in, Hoeffler created an environmental club at her high school titled Students for the Awareness of Global Warming.

In her role as one of Duke’s main sustainability ambassadors, Hoeffler gets to channel her passion. In her position, she works closely with student groups aimed to create positive sustainable change such as lowering the amount of Styrofoam used in Duke University Hospital to ensuring some Duke athletic events create zero waste.

She also leads workshops to teach employees how to make workplaces greener and represents Sustainable Duke at many campus events, championing the goals of Duke’s green future.

“I get to be face-to-face with people all the time, which rocks,” Hoeffler said.

What she loves about Duke: As someone who is tasked with trying to get people to rethink how they treat the world around them, Hoeffler said she appreciates the fact that the Duke community is home to open and curious minds who are ready to embrace the ideas around sustainability.

“There is just so much diversity in thought here that makes so many amazing things possible,” Hoeffler said. “The most sustainable ecosystems are the ones that are most adaptable. And I see Duke as this diverse ecosystem which has this ability to create and implement change. And it’s not just from the students. It’s the staff and faculty. When they all work together, really beautiful things can happen.”

Object she couldn’t do her job without: Hoeffler keeps a photo of her younger brother, Justin, on her desk. Justin is now 11, but in the photo he’s a baby.

“Every time I see that photo it reminds me that there’s another baby being born at this moment and we have to consider what life is going to be like for them,” Hoeffler said. “I don’t want them to fight over resources. I want to make sure they’re thriving and their basic needs are met.”

First job: As a teenager in her hometown of Cranford, New Jersey, Hoeffler helped her grandfather Robert Hoeffler, then Cranford’s mayor, implement a green workplace certification program. Rebecca’s role was to go to participating businesses and verify that they were complying with items on the program’s checklist.

“Literally, what I'm doing today with Duke's Green Certifications for workplaces, labs, and classrooms was my first work experience,” Hoeffler said. “It was great. I was talking to people and getting them on board with the sustainability initiative.”

Something most people don’t know about her: Before she arrived at Duke, Hoeffler served in a similar capacity in the sustainability program at Dartmouth. During a 2015 trip with students to rural West Virginia to study the impact of mountaintop coal removal, Hoeffler and her students came across a puppy.

“We’re walking around this river bend, the sun is shining and the light is glistening off the water, it’s a beautiful day, and around the corner comes this golden yellow puppy,” Hoeffler said.

The puppy, a mix between a yellow lab and a beagle, had no collar and, with the outline of its ribs showing from underneath a golden coat, it appeared malnourished. After being told by a woman who lived nearby that the dog was a stray, Hoeffler decided to take it home with her.

That proved easier said than done as she had to first figure out a way to get her students back to Dartmouth and arrange to have someone in West Virginia watch the dog until she could get back down to get her. In a matter of days, she was able to do just that, picking up the dog – which she named Sadie – and taking her home.

“Sadie’s story makes me really happy because I think adoption is the most sustainable form of pet ownership,” Hoeffler said.

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