(The following story ran in the Fall 2008 issue of Stewards, the alumni magazine of SNRE. The story looked ahead as The Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise prepared to graduate its 15th class in the spring of 2010. The story profiled Laura Rubin, the first graduate of the institute’s dual-degree program.)

Laura Rubin (M.S. ’94, M.B.A. ’95) was so enthused by the dual-degree idea, first proposed in the early 1990s, that she enrolled voluntarily even before the ink was dry on the plan. She knew instinctively then what so many incoming Erb students now take for granted: the paths of business success and environmental stewardship are intertwined and must therefore be studied in tandem.

“I saw this big disconnect between where businesses were and where they needed to be,” said Rubin, who, since 1998, has been executive director of the Ann Arbor-based Huron River Watershed Council. “I felt these two fields – business and the environment – had to come together. I believed then that if I could speak both of the languages, so to speak, I could have a leg up on solving the problems faced by each.”

That, in fact, was the premise behind the program, started with talks between Dean Garry Brewer of the School of Natural Resources and Environment (SNRE) and Dean Joe White of the Business School. By 1992, the schools had jointly established the Corporate Environmental Management Program (CE MP). The dual-degree program was designed to award students a master of business administration and a master of science degree for completing three years of complementary coursework.

The program would be known as CE MP until 2005, when it was renamed the Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise MBA /MS Program. Also in 2005, the Frederick A. and Barbara M. Erb Environmental Management Institute was renamed the Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise.

The Management Institute was established with a gift from the Erbs in 1996 to focus U-M’s capabilities and resources around creating and supporting high-quality teaching and research in the field of environmental management.

Since its founding, the Erb Institute has been a leader in blending the study of business and environment science and policies – an approach to graduate education and research now flourishing at campuses nationally. “Fifteen years ago, the concept of corporate environmental responsibility was still in its infancy. Now, corporations are beginning to weave sustainability into the very fabric of their operations and growth strategies,” said Erb Institute Director Thomas P. Lyon.

“Erb students and alumni are among the emerging business leaders that have helped bring about this change over the past decade and a half.”

The Erb Institute now has nearly 75 students, about 30 of them new this fall; the rest are either in their second or third years of study.

In addition to functioning as the glue between the schools’ respective degree programs, the Erb Institute conducts professional education, academic outreach (from workshops and seminars to conferences) and scientific scholarship. Its programs focus on the environmental roles and relationships among businesses, governments and nonprofit organizations.

An external advisory board aids in developing this strategic direction, which is carried out by a managing director  and Lyon, who holds a joint faculty appointment with SNRE and the Stephen M. Ross School of Business.

From its conception, the dual-degree program’s goal was to equip leaders, executives and managers – whether in the private sector, at a public agency or an environmental nonprofit – with the skills and knowledge needed to create environmentally and economically sustainable organizations.

But the evolution of a related institute with broader educational and outreach goals – what today is known as the Erb Institute – was scarcely envisioned as CE MP debuted and as Rubin stepped forward to become the poster child for sustainability education at the University of Michigan.

“I was very aggressive in telling the deans of my interest, and how I wanted to part of it. Even though the program was still taking shape, they agreed to start letting me take some courses,” Rubin recalled. Even as program details were being finalized, Rubin was already enrolled at SNRE (she started in the fall of 1992) and had spent 1992-93 taking only SNRE courses. Midway through her second and final year at SNRE , she started taking the business courses she knew would apply toward her M.B.A. She also fit in time to take the GMAT exam (a requirement for business-school entry).

Even today, prospective Erb students must apply separately to each school. In her final year (1994-95), Rubin was enrolled only in business classes. By the spring of 1995, she had earned both degrees – and had gone through two graduation ceremonies in six months: one for SNRE and another for the Business School. “I definitely felt like an oddball,” she said. “I was constantly explaining to people what I was doing and At the time, the goals of CEMP fit perfectly with her own. A native of Chicago, Rubin went to Colorado College, where she did her graduate thesis in 1986-87 on a cost-benefit analysis of Great

Lakes water diversion using an economic model.

But it was her experience in the nonprofit world (before entering SNR ) that affirmed her belief that business acumen was largely missing when it came to building a nonprofit organization. After graduating from Colorado College, she had two job offers: one from Greenpeace running its then-new lobbying arm in Washington, D.C., and the other from Arthur Anderson in a program that groomed new hires to become certified public accounts and business consultants.

She asked Arthur Anderson if she could delay her start date for nine months in order to work temporarily at Greenpeace. The accounting firm said no, and so she chose to go work full time in Washington, where she helped get the new organization established and eventually managed a staff of 30.

At Greenpeace, she was exposed to an array of environmental issues and challenges. “I really got to see a nonprofit up close,” she said. Subsequently, she decided to pursue a master’s degree in environmental-related studies, which led her to discover SNRE. Because of her early enthusiasm for the program, Rubin joined program leaders on early donor visits, where she talked about the program and served as an example of the type of students CEMP was created to attract.

Her trailblazing spirit has paid off with a job perfectly suited to her environmental and business interests. Founded in 1965, the Huron River Watershed Council is the first and oldest river protection group in Michigan. A public, nonprofit organization, it is a coalition of Huron Valley residents, businesses and local governments established under Michigan’s Local  River Management Act. Since its formation, it has grown to be a respected voice for protection of the Huron River and its tributary streams, lakes, wetlands and groundwater.

The organization has become a magnet for other SNRE alumni, including Kris Olsson (M.S. ’90, ’00), Cynthia Radcliffe (M.S. ’93), Elizabeth Riggs (M.S. ’99) and Paul Steen (M.S. ’03, Ph.D. ’08).

As executive director, she’s able to blend her business-oriented skills in areas such as information technology, human resources, budgeting and planning with her knowledge and experience as an environmental policy maker and scientist. The combination allows her to move the organization financially and scientifically through its most challenging issues, such as advocating for clean water, recreational access and dam removal.

“It’s a great meeting of skills,” Rubin said. “The degree has allowed me to be a broad generalist in these different but complementary fields."