Strengthening Sustainability Programs and Curricula at the Undergraduate and Graduate Levels (2020) / Chapter Skim
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4 Building the Academic Environment
4 Building the Academic Environment
Pages 83-108
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COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES AS LIVING LABS Higher education institutions can provide students with valuable experiential learning opportunities as accessible living labs. Chatham University in Pittsburgh and Syracuse University in upstate New York provide illustrative examples of living labs (see Box 4-1)
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For example, the Sustainability Graduate Summer Intensive program in 2019 provided experiential learning resources at Eden Hall Campus for students prepared to study at the graduate level (Chatham University, 2019b)
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. BRIDGING DISCIPLINARY SILOS Part of the committee's task was to identify knowledge gaps and critical barriers related to the effective development of interdisciplinary sustainability programs.
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. Sustainability is highly interdisciplinary in nature, therefore it is essential that sustainability programs overcome the separation of academic disciplines, despite the inertia of disciplinary structures. Sustainability programs can be launched and evolve under a variety of institutional arrangements, but a commitment to and value of interdisciplinary approaches is fundamental (Vincent and Mulkey, 2015) , particularly from top leaders of higher education institutions (Hart et al., 2016; Boone et al., 2020)
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who successfully engage in interdisci plinary collaborations. • Manage sustainability curricula and education programs across depart ments to foster interdisciplinary approaches and encourage responsibility for programs across the college or university.
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Key elements that enable such institutes to function effectively include a service mindset, an aim to "complement not compete" with existing organizations, broad participation, engagement, and relationship building, and careful communication with students and other institutional stakeholders. Another approach to bridge disciplinary silos in sustainability education is to help faculty in other fields introduce sustainability concepts in their courses, even if they are not "sustainability professors" offering an explicit "sustainability course." A pioneer is the Piedmont/Ponderosa Model of Faculty Development at Emory University and Northern Arizona University (NAU)
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The Alliance of Sustainability and Environmental Academic Leaders, National Council for Science and the Environment, and North American Association for Environmental Education are a few examples that offer national or global conferences, networking, and information sharing for researchers and practitioners from multiple disciplines.3 Another example is the Association for Environmental Studies and Sciences, established as an academic home for environmental studies, sciences, and sustainability faculty and students. Given the highly interdisciplinary nature of sustainability, it is essential that sustainability programs overcome the artificial separation of academic disciplines, including curriculum planning, such as the definition of content, learning outcomes, assessments, and goals of the academic programs.
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Workshop participants were in agreement that, to achieve the SDGs and other sustainability goals, the concepts of diversity, equity, and inclusion must be infused into sustainability education. Graduates of sustainability programs will engage a broad range of community, government, and corporate stakeholders and work in virtually every job sector identifiable; therefore, preparing a diverse workforce for sustainability careers across the globe is essential to the success of sustainability actions.
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workforce. Historically Black colleges and universities that provide sustainability programs include the School of the Environment at Florida A&M University; the Forestry, Ecology, and Wildlife Program at Alabama A&M University; the College of Agriculture, Environment, and Nutrition Sciences at Tuskegee University; the Marine Sciences Program at Savannah State University; and the Department of Marine and Environmental Science at Hampton University.4 High-Hispanicenrollment institutions also have well-established environmental programs.
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To help boost the number of underrepresented minority students, low-income students, and first-generation students who embark on sustainability careers, some colleges and universities are providing sustainability-related diversity pathway programs and leadership opportunities. Box 4-2 highlights two such programs at the University of Michigan.
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They also work in conservation and sustainability-related jobs, and have held prestigious fellow ships such as the Environmental Leadership Program's RAY Marine Conservation Diversity Fellowship, Swarthmore College's President's Sustainability Research Fellowship, the Smithsonian Institution's internship in marine sciences, and the Fulbright Scholar Program. The University of Michigan is one of four institutions that participate in the DDCSP program, along with the DDCSP Collaborative, University of California, Santa Cruz, and University of Washington (Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, 2020)
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2020. Doris Duke Conservation Scholars Program.
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(2020) find that the relationship between faculty values toward diversity content and its inclusion is greater at master's colleges and universities, based on a national sample of 227 interdisciplinary environmental and sustainability programs within 149 higher education institutions.
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Several institutions have incorporated Indigenous knowledge into their sustainability programs. The University of Montana offers an Indigenous Knowledge and Environmental Sustainability focus area within its environmental studies master's program,11 and NAU has a tribal elder on campus every semester to share insights and work with students and faculty.12 It is essential to have greater emphasis on U.S.
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This also requires attracting and retaining faculty from diverse backgrounds in sustainability educa tion programs, with additional attention to equity, inclusion, and local and Indigenous knowledge in the content of the curriculum and the institutional settings. FEDERAL SUPPORT OF SUSTAINABILITY PROGRAMS IN HIGHER EDUCATION Policy makers have recognized the role that campus sustainability programs have in achieving societal goals.
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2928) .14 The proposed legislation states the following: From the amounts appropriated to carry out this section, the Secretary, in con sultation with the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, shall make grants to eligible entities to establish sustainability programs to design and implement the teaching and practice of sustainability, including in the areas of staff and faculty professional development, energy management, greenhouse gas emissions reductions, green building, waste management, transportation, resilience, green workforce, and other aspects of sustainability that integrate the local community with multidisciplinary academic programs and are applicable to the private and government sectors.
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: Office of Sustainable Fisheries; Climate Program Office; Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research; National Sea Grant College Program.17 NOAA supports U.S. engagement strategies for the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development.
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The Higher Education Sustainability Act of 2019 under consideration by Congress recognizes the role that universities play to "design and implement the teaching and practice of sustainability, including in the areas of staff and faculty professional development, energy management, greenhouse gas emissions reductions, green building, waste management, transportation, resilience, green workforce, and other aspects of sustainability." Given the range of federal programs that currently support sustainability-related activities, other agencies would also be suitable to support grant programs for sustainability education and research. In addition, it is critical to ensure that minority-serving institutions, as codified by the U.S.
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advocated for research into sustainability science as an interdisciplinary field, this committee recommends a sustainability education research agenda that addresses how the field has evolved and how it will continue to evolve. We suggest a focus on three broad themes that concern existing knowledge gaps in relation to sustainability education. First, research is needed on the effectiveness of sustainability curricula, both for the purpose of program-level evaluation and as part of a global community of practice.
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. The evolution of sustainability programs will include emerging areas highlighted during the committee's workshops, such as artificial intelligence and machine learning, big data, and questions of ethics and bias within these enablers.
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how core competencies and content areas in sustainability programs may be converging, diverging, or otherwise evolving; and (iv) how these programs will prepare stu dents for a post-2030 agenda for sustainable development.
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2019. Artificial intelligence and sustainable development.
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2020. Artificial intelligence enhanced decision support for informing global sustainable development: A human-centric AI-thinking approach.
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Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations. Federal Register 59(32)
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2020. The role of artificial intelligence in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.
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