Meet the 2017 Greenbuild Scholarship Recipients from the Carolinas
USGBC North Carolina and USGBC South Carolina announce this year’s Rob Eggers Memorial Scholarship winners.
USGBC North Carolina and USGBC South Carolina would like to congratulate their 2017 Rob Eggers Memorial Scholarship recipients, who will receive funding to attend Greenbuild Boston. The scholarship is funded through proceeds of the communities’ Green Gala and Sustainable Business Awards, which is being held on Sept. 21, 2017 at the Ritz-Carlton in Charlotte.
The Green Gala will also feature the opportunity for you to vote in a live poll for your favorite scholarship recipient to receive an additional $1,000 to fund a Green Apple Day of Service project in a community of their choice.
The Rob Eggers Memorial Scholarship fund was established by USGBC North Carolina in honor of the late Rob Eggers, a valued member of the Charlotte sustainable design world. A longtime volunteer with the local USGBC community, Rob served on the Education and Programs Committee. His volunteer work was instrumental in developing programs for the local branch and in strengthening partnerships with other organizations to provide education throughout the region. Passionate about education, Rob taught classes at several community colleges, and he became the first person to receive the LEED AP—Neighborhood Development credential in North Carolina. Through this scholarship, USGBC North Carolina seeks to commemorate Rob’s dedication to education by providing financial and community support to students pursuing a degree in a program with a focus on the built environment and sustainability.
The scholarship is organized through the local Emerging Professionals program, which bolsters the careers of young professionals from a range of disciplines through networking opportunities and hands-on leadership experience. The program equips participants with the tools they need to succeed as leaders of their chapters, organizations, communities and the sustainability movement. It offers a fresh, innovative perspective to USGBC communities and secures the future of green building by maintaining a pipeline of passionate, competent leaders.
Meet the scholarship recipients:
Jennifer Dreisbach
Jennifer Dreisbach, USGBC South Carolina Low Country Education Chair
LS3P, Charleston, South Carolina
“I hope to leverage the knowledge I gain from Greenbuild to address issues vital to the success and preservation of my local community and communities afflicted with similar (social equity) challenges.”
Dreisbach completed her architecture degree at Georgia Tech University, where she acquired an appreciation for the symbiotic relationship of historic architecture and sustainability in historic preservation. After graduating, she moved to Charleston in pursuit of leveraging her architecture history minor to help with sustainable reuse. She currently works at LS3P in Charleston, South Carolina, and is an active volunteer with USGBC. Jenny has served as the community’s Low Country Education Chair, responsible with facilitating transformation and enabling others through education, and is the design lead for the Charleston East Side Development ADVANCE Project. She plans to continue to graduate school in pursuit of dual master’s degrees in architecture and city planning, with a focus in sustainability.
Samuel P. Snodgrass
Past USGBC North Carolina Cape Fear Emerging Professionals Chair
Cape Fear Community College Graduate
“By helping me to attend Greenbuild 2017, you will be drastically aiding my efforts to launch Entre-Renewable, a social media-based education platform focused around the impacts of technology and innovation on the green building and renewable energy sectors.”
Snodgrass is a recent graduate of Cape Fear Community College’s Sustainability Technologies program, where he obtained an understanding of renewable energy systems and green building concepts. He has served as the most recent past chair for the USGBC North Carolina Cape Fear Emerging Professionals Committee, where he launched “Industry Insights,” a sequence of monthly tours and demonstrations with professionals in local sustainability, renewable energy and building performance. This educational forum offers networking opportunities for emerging professionals and delivers insight as to how local business are integrating sustainability principles into their operations. Snodgrass has a passion for new technology trends and how they will be applied to the green building sector, the power of social media on the green building market and sustainable fitness centers.
Katelyn Mueller
USGBC North Carolina Triangle Emerging Professionals Co-Chair
North Carolina State University Master’s Candidate in Civil Engineering
“A core component of my career interests is the potential for interdisciplinary work, and a key aspect of Greenbuild is that it highlights that the green building field does not consist exclusively of architects or engineers. By attending, I hope to gain a better understanding of the range of professions involved and the ways in which they interact, especially as I prepare to enter the workforce.”
Mueller is currently pursuing her master’s degree in civil engineering at North Carolina State University. Her thesis involves “the investigation of the point at which environmental impacts avoided by replacing underperforming buildings with new, high performance construction exceed the impacts generated from new construction.” She is also a research assistant, conducting a life cycle assessment on a renewable energy technology that generates electricity using salinity gradients at the interface of saltwater and freshwater. Upon completing her master’s, she hopes to work in public works or urban planning, with an emphasis on policy. She serves as an active USGBC North Carolina volunteer, co-chairing the Triangle’s Emerging Professionals committee.
