Search

Unsustainable development in Egypt has increased water, air and soil pollution, which caused health problems and endangered natural and human resources. The effort to increase the economic well-being has caused enormous damages to the society and the environment. Only sustainable development will enable Egyptians to attain a better quality of life and meet their current needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. EduCamp is a European-Egyptian project entitled 'EduCamp: education for sustainable development beyond the campus' which aims to introduce key sustainable development principles into teaching and learning in the Egyptian public schools. EduCamp followed four main principles to introduce ESD into Egyptian schools. These include (a) a partnership approach between different stakeholders, (b) changing pedagogical practices, (c) teacher development through training the trainers, and (d) developing public understanding and awareness of sustainability. The main achievements of EduCamp are (a) Developing ESD resource kits for schools to provide activities for teachers and students which link the existing school curriculum to the local community. The kits include activities related to biodiversity, agriculture, energy, and water. (b) A school teachers' training programme has been developed and applied to enable teachers to implement ESD and use the kits in their teaching activities. (c) Seven ESD Centres of Excellence have been established to promote and support the introduction of ESD into the education system and provide teachers' training programmes. It is premature to draw a quantitative conclusion about the impact nationwide because change takes time and the implementation of ESD presents a long-lasting process, which will take many years to achieve. The indicators of direct impact on teachers' and students' performance are promising. This discussion paper presents and examines EduCamp. The paper is divided into three main sections. Firstly, the authors set the context for the project, explore the issue of education for sustainable development (ESD) and examine current issues facing education in Egypt. Secondly, the authors discuss the project in relation to relevant literature, often curriculum change literature, in order to explore the merits and challenges of the project and the extent to which curriculum change is actually feasible as a result of the project. Finally, the paper concludes by reflecting on the challenges ahead. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Uptake of sustainability into campus administration has been identified as important for establishing and maintaining campus sustainability initiatives because of its ability to institutionalize sustainability on campuses. This paper explores how higher education institutions (HEIs) are defining and enacting sustainability in campus administration, using policy documents as a tool to achieve this. This paper analyzes the sustainability policies of 21 Canadian HEIs that have used the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. The policies were coded thematically with a focus on the conceptualizations of sustainability, conceptualizations of campus sustainability, and how the documents address the dominant themes found in the sustainability in higher education scholarly literature. This paper finds that most policies conceptualized sustainable development using the Brundtland definition, with aspects of environment, society, and economy. Policies conceptualized campus sustainability as including teaching, research, operations, and community outreach, with policy goals that emphasize facilities initiatives. This paper contributes to our understanding of the challenges and priorities associated with integrating sustainability into the administration of Canadian HEI institutions at the end of the DESD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on findings from an analysis of data submitted through the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System (STARS). STARS has addressed the demand for standard metrics to measure sustainability progress at US and Canadian colleges and universities, with expanding access to institutions in other countries gained through the launch of an International Pilot and release of STARS 2.0. Since its release in 2009, STARS has emerged as a reputable source of data that can provide a broad overview of the state of campus sustainability. The release of STARS Version 2.0 in 2013 improved upon the original reporting framework and also expanded accessibility of STARS to all higher education institutions worldwide. The findings in this paper tell the story of a campus sustainability movement that is quite young. As STARS matures along with this movement, STARS data will hopefully show a trend of continuous improvement at participating institutions. By participating in STARS and learning from examples set by other institutions, colleges and universities from across the world can be on the leading edge of moving toward a more just and sustainable world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last decades several international initiatives have emphasised that education is an imperative for societies to become more sustainable. This special volume stream is comprised of 33 papers that illustrate some of the efforts being taken by higher education institutions to contribute to sustainability. The majority of the papers were presented at the European Roundtable on Sustainable Consumption and Production – Environmental Management for Sustainable Universities conference in Istanbul, Turkey in 2013. The papers address topics such as implementation of sustainable development, stakeholder engagement and participation, campus operations, sustainability reporting and assessment, organisational change management, and curriculum development. the papers in this special volume stream provide significant steps for the higher education for sustainable development discipline by exploring new and rethink theories, approaches, concepts, methods, and frameworks, as well as providing case studies and guidelines for practitioners. As the collection of papers shows, there have been many efforts in the implementation of sustainable development in higher education institutions; however, there are still many challenges to integrate sustainable development into their systems, and many opportunities for research in the topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interdisciplinary environmental and sustainability (IES) academic programs have an important and distinctive role in education for sustainability: preparing sustainability-oriented problem solvers who work at the science-policy, science-management, and policy-management interfaces. IES programs are rapidly expanding at college and universities in the USA and exhibit a variety of forms, including interdisciplinary degree programs housed within a traditional department; programs that span departments, a college, multiple colleges, or the entire university; programs that reside in their own IES departments, schools, or colleges; and degree programs located within IES institutes and centers. A very few institutions are addressing IES education in a holistic manner by developing dedicated campuses for sustainability education or reorganizing their entire campus structure to support sustainability science education and research. This paper presents how Unity College, a small environmental college, reorganized its administrative structure, curriculum and pedagogy around a sustainability science framework. It also illustrates the influence that various forms of IES programs have on sustainability education in the USA as revealed by national studies conducted by the Center for Environmental Education Research of the National Council for Science and the Environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper summarizes the state of knowledge in relation to advances in education for sustainable development focused on higher education and in generic competencies, reviewing some of the existing proposals in the literature and analyzing other university approaches. It has focused on the curricula, applying a participatory methodology based on surveys and expert consultation for the identification and selection of generic competencies related to sustainability in a civil engineering degree at Universidad Europea (Spain). From the literature review, 17 generic competencies were preselected. A set of five weighted transversal competencies and their acquisition level have been obtained through surveys to stakeholders and interviews with experts. Critical thinking, adaptation to change, decision making, problem solving, and multidisciplinary team-working were chosen in order of importance. Competence acquisition level was addressed as not easy to rate or it seems to be exigent for graduate students. Problem-based learning is also selected as the best choice for the development of these sustainability generic skills in the entire civil engineering degree. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Education for sustainable development (ESD) is transformative education aiming at developing participants’ understanding of sustainability issues and transforming their attitudes and behaviours regarding environment, society and economy. Sustainability consciousness, an expected outcome of ESD, is a complex of cognitive and affective learning. Development of sustainability consciousness requires transformative learning experiences. The study presented in this paper employed action research to enhance sustainability consciousness of the preservice teachers through inquiry based learning. The study was done in the Institute of Education, Lahore College for Women University, Pakistan. The study integrated sustainability education in an existing course entitled ‘Research Methods in Education’. The course is included in the final year of B.Ed. (Honours) programme. Outcome of the ESD-integration was measured in terms of change in the sustainability consciousness of the preservice teachers. The Action Research project engaged 27 preservice teachers in inquiry-based learning (empirical investigations and research based discussions) for a period of 11 weeks. The participants investigated sustainability issues collaboratively. To investigate the change in participants’ sustainability consciousness through inquiry based learning, researchers collected through pre- and post-tests, interviews and observation. Quantitative data were analyzed through paired t -test while qualitative data through thematic coding. The data indicate that empirical investigations into sustainability issues by the presevice teachers and research-based discussions enhanced preservice teachers’ sustainability consciousness. This highlights the transformative potential of inquiry based learning. Moreover, it indicates that sustainability education can be successfully integrated in the course of ‘research methods in education’. The findings suggest that teacher education programmes and other university programmes may employ inquiry based learning as a vehicle to enhance sustainability consciousness of the undergraduate students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Canadian Journal of Higher Education is the property of Canadian Society for the Study of Higher Education and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In research and literature about integration of sustainable development in higher education, particular attention is given towards barriers for change and critical success factors, mainly with a focus on organisational aspects. Implementation models and integration guidelines are defined in order to guide sustainable development integration in higher education at the level of a single higher education institution. These initiatives look at factors that influence the integration process, however seldom from the perspective of change management and the impact of human factors on organisational change. This paper studies higher education from the perspective of organisational change management and, more specifically, focuses on analysing the human factors in this process: resistance, communication, empowerment and involvement, and organisational culture. A conceptual model, which links human factors to the sustainable development integration process, is presented. The model structures and supports the analysis of this integration process in a higher education institution. It is applied in a specific case study of a Belgian university college. The results indicate that the conceptual model helps to get a profound understanding of human related barriers for integrating sustainable development in higher education, as well as to understand the underlying reasons for these barriers and linkages between them in different stages of the integration process. Another main lesson learned is the importance of continuously supporting ambassadors of sustainable development integration in higher education. These and other insights from the case study are valuable for supporting future integration processes in higher education. Next to that, the model supports scholars to study the integration process of sustainable development and gather profound insights on what and why changes happen. This can trigger individual and collective reflexivity on sustainable development in higher education. Future research includes further improvements and application of the model in other cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last decade, sustainability reporting (SR) has gained importance in both profit and non-profit environments. In spite of the slowly emerging trend of SR in higher education, it is still unclear for certain actors within this field what SR entails. This paper offers a comprehensive review of the existing literature on SR in higher education, aimed at providing guidance on the topic, uncovering gaps and inconsistencies in the literature, and finding new paths for research. The findings show that the topic of SR has been approached in a rather fragmented way in the literature, while the scientific field would benefit from more in-depth studies, preferably supplemented by empirical evidence. Important issues for future research are: the potential of SR for organisational change, the influence of stakeholder engagement processes on SR, the link between SR and general sustainability management, and the link between existing reporting indicators, tools, and management standards. Structuring and defining these topics can stimulate scholars to further study them in depth, leading to a better understanding of the dynamics of the reporting process, and in a broader sense of the process of sustainability integration in higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The key factors affecting the sustainability of our society are research, conversion, delivery and the efficient use of energy resources. The expertise, attitudes and sustainability awareness of decision-makers determine far-reaching political decisions made regarding whole energy systems as well as the choices available for individual consumers. Despite the significance of education with respect to renewable energy and sustainability, the position of these topics remains unclear in degree programmes. Measuring the relevance of these subjects can be considered a central issue in terms of promoting a more sustainability-oriented perspective on education strategy formation. Therefore, this paper presents a new curriculum development method for stimulating discussions about the learning outcomes of the degree programmes. This method has been used to calculate a proposed relevance ratio (RR) index, which indicated the relative weight of renewable energy and sustainability topics for energy studies in Aalto University's energy degree programme. The benefits of this RR index include the ability to reveal the strengths and weaknesses of selected contents in the curricula. However, more research is needed to integrate wider working life skills with the students' learning path as a means of promoting student expertise. This new tool will be universally applicable and quantify the desired contents of learning outcomes in degree programmes at universities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research presented in this paper emerged from the need to identify the factors influencing academic staff members when engaging in Education for Sustainable Development in real practice. The aims of this study were to explore: (i) the factors influencing academic staff engagement in Education for Sustainable Development; and (ii) the views and vision of academic staff in relation to Education for Sustainable Development at the University of Southampton. This research was conceived as an exploratory action research study and consisted of two differentiated research stages. In Stage I fourteen academic staff members from different disciplines were interviewed as a reconnaissance phase of a typical action research cycle. In Stage II a facilitator role for curriculum development was adopted by one of the authors as part of her doctoral studies. An interdisciplinary group of five academic staff members from different subject areas was created with the aim to support the group's critical reflection and action. This research was undertaken between October 2011 and May 2013. This study suggests that although academics might have a personal interest and motivation to engage in Education for Sustainable Development, factors such as the lack of time and financial resources, lack of deep understanding of sustainability, current curriculum structures and ways of delivery, academic pressures, external factors, lack of organisational support and existing organisational conditions block their engagement in Education for Sustainable Development. Organisational support and leadership, quality assurance processes, professional development and creating reward structures are necessary strategies towards academic staff engagement in this agenda. This study provides evidence on different views and visions of academics in relation to Education for Sustainable Development and a number of contradictions between its principles and the role of Higher Education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability issues in higher educational institutions have attracted increasing levels of attention from both the public and policy makers in recent decades. A number of previous studies have called for a more comprehensive integration of sustainable development into mainstream university operations and curricula. However, there is a lack of sufficient studies that investigate sustainable development in higher education in Spain. Therefore, the present paper has two goals: First, the study analyses the extent to which Spanish universities have implemented sustainability practices in their institutions. To accomplish this task, data were collected using a survey distributed to rectors and senior management at Spanish higher education institutions. The second goal is to examine the main factors that might explain the implementation of sustainability practices in Spanish universities. For this purpose, Pearson chi-square tests were used to analyse the data collected in the survey. Key findings show the slow rate of progress of many Spanish universities with regard to implementing sustainability practices, a fact which could indicate that there are clearly a number of obstacles to overcome. Additionally, there were no factors influencing the implementation of sustainability practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability has received increasing attention in management education over the past ten years. This article reviews a decade's worth of research in a systematic analysis of 63 articles published in international higher education and management education journals between 2003 and 2013. The purpose of this article is to map and review the publications based on the analysis according to the following four categories: (1) Types of papers, (2) Challenges, (3) Teaching techniques, and (4) Curriculum orientation. The scientific value of this article focuses on three main contributions to management education. First, while most articles are descriptive, focusing on specific, unique experiences in a given institution or with a particular teaching method or tool, few situate themselves within the broader philosophy and design of management education. The second contribution is an evaluation of the status of sustainability in management education as a field of study. This systematic review highlights the lack of consistency in the concepts used: no stable categories emerge from these articles and very few studies integrate the three levels of educational philosophy – teaching, program design, and learning. Third, this review highlights future directions for sustainability in management education institution-wide. While all articles highlight the need for curriculum change, very few specify how this change could and would be achieved by course design or explicit educational paradigms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inspired by the UN decade on education for sustainable development, the Learning City designed an innovative curriculum and pedagogy to enable sustainability learning in a university classroom setting. We provide a brief overview of the project and then detail the classroom in regard to the five features that shape it. We also introduce the two major legacies of the Learning City and detail their relationship to the five features. The relevance of this work extends to many fields beyond sustainability education, including educational research, program evaluation, sustainability, urban policy, social capital, and the emerging field of the scholarship of teaching and learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past few decades, there has been growing emphasis on sustainable development and a growing need to train students to think sustainably in preparation for their careers as practicing engineers. Thinking sustainably requires the consideration of not only environmental impacts but also societal and economic impacts. Thus, teaching future engineers to think sustainably requires a multifaceted, multipronged approach. To that end, a team of faculty from the Departments of Civil, Industrial, and Mechanical Engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington acquired funding from the National Science Foundation to implement a project entitled 'Engineering Sustainable Engineers.' The project was designed to infuse undergraduate curricula in the three departments with sustainability, which was augmented by incorporating sustainability emphasis into other aspects of the undergraduate experience. Key program elements were (1) learning modules developed for courses across all levels of matriculation within the three curricula, (2) quality sustainable internships, and (3) a multidisciplinary senior design project with a sustainability focus. This paper summarizes the rationale, approaches, and results for integrating sustainability into the civil engineering undergraduate learning experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the results of a study of emotional competence and individual style of action of students – future teachers of higher education in the system of education for sustainable development (EDS). The theoretical analysis of the application possibilities of the system (ideas) of EDS is performed. The study highlights a number of competences that are consistent with the components of emotional competence and individual style of action. The study involves 20 students of pedagogical specialties from Almaty, Kazakh-stan. The components of emotional competence and individual style of action are investigated using self-assessment questionnaires. The article presents the answer to the question of whether there are stable links between the components of emotional competence and individual style of action as well as draws conclusions on the importance of developing emotional competence in the EDS system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Teaching Innovations / Inovacije u Nastavi is the property of University of Belgrade, Faculty of Teacher Education and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The City of Colwood in British Columbia, Canada, has engaged in a wide-ranging project aiming to encourage whole community transformation, through the use of environmental education, incentives and the adoption of energy efficiency behavior and technologies. Researchers and students from Royal Roads University partnered with a Middle School to deliver an action research driven educational program to 120 Grade 7 (age 12/13) students that reflected goals of the City program: water conservation, solar hot water and the energy efficiency of homes. Students engaged in classroom activities and field trips to homes with energy upgrades installed. The students' subject matter engagement was captured through systematic observation, field notes and photographs, and the development of knowledge was assessed through curriculum exercises and a quantitative survey. Both students and their parents were surveyed to see whether the interaction with the students had implications for intergenerational learning and the possibility of increasing wider community engagement in the program. It was found that while the students engaged in the classroom session did increase their awareness and understanding of energy efficiency, curriculum design needed to include more opportunities to discuss the issues at home to maximize the opportunities for intergenerational learning and an increase in awareness more generally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent natural events such as earthquakes in Japan and storm surge effects in New York have led to the growing interest in sustainable civil engineering. While sustainability topics, such as soil liquefaction and green building design, are typically included within civil engineering programs at the baccalaureate or graduate levels, topics in sustainability can be adapted for secondary school students as well. In addition, efforts to attract quality and diverse students into civil engineering have given rise to engineering camps aimed at secondary school students. This research focuses on the exploration of civil engineering sustainable module topics for secondary school students through the development of content as well as implementation of two case studies. Sustainability module topics are identified and instructional content (lesson objectives, key concepts, activities, experiments, and other pedagogical techniques) are proposed. Two modules are applied at the Bucknell Engineering Summer Camp program, targeting secondary school students. The module topics developed, as well as the case study results, can provide examples for how engineering educators throughout the country can introduce sustainable civil engineering as a way to encourage future civil engineering students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is becoming more common for sustainability-related engineering classes to engage in various forms of service and project learning activities that provide assistance to partners. However, few efforts have examined the relationship between the types of partners and the motivations for implementation of the sustainability recommendations to provide a larger context to students. The partners in pollution prevention program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln completed an analysis of past partners and found that those in the manufacturing sector were more likely to provide direct financial savings justifications for pollution prevention and sustainability implementation, whereas the public institutions and other businesses were more likely to also cite social factors. An analysis of implemented recommendations found that there was a wide variation in implementation rates and the frequency with which benefits persisted beyond one year for different categories of implemented recommendations. For example, preventative maintenance recommendations had the highest rate of implementation and persistence of benefits, whereas off-site recycling recommendations had a relatively low rate of benefit persistence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability concepts and technologies were integrated in the context of an existing course titled 'Introduction to Environmental Engineering' at the University of Cincinnati. It was taught four times with sustainability integration and three times without from 2003 to 2011. Various versions of the sustainability concept were introduced and solid examples related to environmental sustainability were provided, such as green buildings, alternative energy, water conservation, wastewater treatment, and municipal solid waste management, in order to better illustrate the concept to the students. The effectiveness of sustainability integration was evaluated in the forms of homework assignments, exams, student surveys, and instructor observations. The sustainability content accounted for 15 to 25% of course sessions. Comparing with this course without sustainability integration, the formerly intended technical content of the course can still be preserved with sustainability integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]