Director, Office of Sustainability

Position Summary
The Director of Sustainability advances The George Washington University’s sustainability and long term infrastructure resilience goals through the implementation and coordination of initiatives across campus operations, with a strong emphasis on energy, utilities, and engineering collaboration, as well as support for academic priorities and student engagement. Reporting to the Assistant Vice President of Utilities, Energy, and Engineering, this role ensures alignment between sustainability objectives, infrastructure planning, energy management, and capital investment, and is designed as a hands-on, execution-focused position operating in a resource-constrained environment.

The Director provides strategic leadership for GW’s public-facing sustainability initiatives, including energy transition and emissions management strategies, while positioning the campus as a living laboratory for teaching, research, and experiential learning. Working closely with Finance, Facilities, Procurement, Legal, faculty, students, and external community partners, the Director manages risk, optimizes costs, secures funding, and delivers measurable outcomes that strengthen GW’s reputation, support enrollment and retention, and advance long-term institutional commitments.

Office of Sustainability Overview:
The Office of Sustainability is supported by three full-time professional staff members and approximately 20 part-time student employees. The Director of Sustainability is expected to effectively leverage this structure, along with operating with influence and cross-departmental collaboration, to deliver measurable outcomes on campus. Current programs that are a major focus – Emissions reductions and sustainability reporting, GW’s Zero Waste program, with efforts including Green Move Out, ReUse Market, and composting deployment, The Loop and textile donation/reuse efforts, campus micro mobility opportunities and improvement, Single Use Plastics Policy education and adherence, to name a few.

More information: GW Commitments

Key Responsibilities

Performs other related duties as assigned. The omission of specific duties does not preclude the supervisor from assigning duties that are logically related to the position.