Curriculum

Introduction

One of the primary functions of colleges and universities is to educate students. By training and educating future leaders, scholars, workers, and professionals; higher education institutions are uniquely positioned to understand and address sustainability challenges. Institutions that offer courses covering sustainability issues help equip their students to lead society to a sustainable future.

7980 resources

Leveraging Sustainability to Bridge the High School-to-College Curriculum Divide

  • Bay Area Clean Energy Careers (BayCEC) (CA)

Bringing sustainability into the curriculum is one of most timely challenges facing today's faculty and instructors. While some schools and campuses are designing new courses to address sustainable concepts ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Sustainability courses for students with busy schedules: "The Environment Today"

  • Carnegie Mellon University (PA)

Carnegie Mellon University has instituted environmental education across its curriculum over the past five years. The latest course addition, "The Environment Today," was spearheaded by student organizations at Carnegie Mellon ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Building Sustainability Programs and Administration, From Workforce Development to Degrees

  • Central Carolina Community College (NC)

Our institution began developing sustainable education programs over twelve years ago as a response to local farmers' request to train farmers in organic and sustainable agriculture practices. From those first ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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North American Sustainability Issues: Educating Students through Exchanges and Research

  • Daemen University (NY)

The Consortium for North American Sustainability (CNAS), a partnership among six institutions from the US, Canada and Mexico, aims to provide students with a deep understanding of how local and ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Geospatial sustainability: what is geospatial about sustainability, and what does it mean to students' learning of sustainability?

  • DePaul University (IL)

In this presentation I will promote the concept of geospatial sustainability with respect to sustainability curriculum. Geospatial sustainability highlights the geographic nature of sustainability with the help of digital and ...

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Teaching Climate Change Across the Disciplines

  • Dickinson College (PA)

Global climate change has far reaching implications for the environment, social justice, and economic wellbeing, now and in the future. Effective teaching that enables students to think critically about climate ...

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Food Systems Carbon Footprint Analyzed by Students and University Stakeholders

  • Elon University (NC)

The University's Sustainability Master Plan has targeted carbon neutrality across the institution by 2037. To help meet this goal, students in the Environmental Studies Senior capstone course worked with ...

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GIS and Sustainability: Project based Introductory GIS Course Curriculum

  • Furman University (SC)

An introductory level GIS course was modified to incorporate a sustainability focused term project. Students in the class learn the basics of GIS through lectures, intense classroom discussions, and structured ...

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Linking Geology and Sustainability in Iceland

  • Furman University (SC)

Iceland provides an interesting case for the benefits of study abroad despite the carbon costs. First, geologically, Iceland is uniquely located on the mid-Atlantic ridge plate boundary, is geologically diverse ...

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Research and Teaching Opportunities With an On-Campus Ecological Wastewater Treatment System

  • Furman University (SC)

Advanced wetland treatment systems combine the energy efficiency of natural ecological processes with the small footprint and stringent effluent standards of conventional wastewater treatment systems and provide multiple teaching and ...

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How much have students learned?: Outcomes Assessments for Sustainability Education

  • Green Mountain College (VT)

With the increasing attention on sustainability curricula, more emphasis should be placed on the assessment of what students actually learn from such curricula. AASHE's STARS has helped to focus ...

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Idea and Practice of Sustainability: A First-Year Student Experience

  • Hartwick College (NY)

Sustainability provides an interdisciplinary framework for studying the most compelling struggles of our time. In academia, sustainability offers structured and spontaneous opportunities for the curriculum to infiltrate campus operations and ...

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Sand, Clay, and Straw: Green Housing by Students for Students

  • Hartwick College (NY)

Hartwick College, a small liberal arts institution, has shown leadership in engaging students in the design and construction of natural buildings for student residences. Ten years ago, students in a ...

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Alternative University Appraisal Project - ESD and HEI'S in Asia Pacific

  • Hokkaido University (Hokkaido)

The growth in the number of HEIs coupled with fast growing competition between them has contributed to the boom and popularity of comparisons, rankings and classifications of HEIs.

Higher education ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Student Internships as the Driver for Campus Sustainability

  • Indiana University Bloomington (IN)

In its first six months of existence, the Indiana University Task Force on Sustainability established the Internship Program in Sustainability. Utilizing campus as a living laboratory, the program enlists undergraduate ...

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Building a solar house for interdisciplinary learning of sustainability

  • Iowa State University (IA)

In 2009 this Midwestern University participated for the first time in the Solar Decathlon. The resulting 800sft solar powered home was the product of a multiyear effort, which demonstrates the ...

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Synergy between students, academia and industry: Prospects for curriculum enhancement

  • Iowa State University (IA)

In the 2010 Worldwatch Institute Report, David Orr asks the question, ―What kind of education will enable the rising generation to deal with increasingly complex and portentous global issues?(p ...

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Encouraging Sustainable Apparel Consumption among Undergraduate Students

  • Kansas State University (KS)

The purpose of this two-part study is to examine relationships between knowledge of and attitudes towards sustainability in the apparel and textile (AT) industry and students' apparel purchasing behaviors.

In ...

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Teaching Skills for Sustainable Development, Countering Assumptions

  • Kansas State University (KS)

An eight-week pilot was conducted in an apparel and textiles (AT) course in which three skills considered paramount to education for sustainable development (ESD) (collaboration/cooperation, communication, and conflict resolution ...

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Case Study Approach to Developing Sustainability Curriculum

  • Keene State College (NH)

Case Study Approach to Developing Sustainability Curriculum

We have made a commitment to incorporating sustainability throughout our curriculum, providing students with opportunities to engage with sustainability initiatives on campus and ...

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Sustainability Across the Curriculum Project at Lane Community College

  • Lane Community College (OR)

The goal of Sustainability Infusion Project at Lane Community College was to infuse sustainability concepts through all instructional disciplines. 105 instructors participated from more than 15 different disciplines including Adult ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Interweaving Academic Reading Skill Development with Global Warming and Sustainability Education

  • Montgomery College (MD)

There are still people who do not know much about, or even deny the existence of, global warming. Education may, therefore, play a role in our efforts to reduce the ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Student Sustainability Internship Program: Creatively Involving Students in Sustainability Efforts

  • Oregon Institute of Technology (OR)

Sustainability initiatives on college campuses, whether education campaigns or tracking and reporting for STARS, require significant time commitments that often cannot be met by sustainability personnel. Simultaneously, students are seeking ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Design as a major that integrates art, science & sustainability

  • Pacific University (OR)

The development of sustainability as an academic discipline will require the creation of non-traditional majors that integrate knowledge fundamental to this endeavor. We describe collaboration at Pacific University between the ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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A business case for developing transformative sustainable education

  • Pennsylvania State University (PA)

Colleges and Universities have obvious financial incentives to invest in sustainability objectives that reduce the costs of campus operation. Similarly, investments in research infrastructure in topics of energy and sustainability ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Portland State University's Sustainability Journey: War Stories and Lessons Learned

  • Portland State University (OR)

This paper tells the story of building academic sustainability programs at Portland State University over the last decade, distilling key scientific and organizational principles that have underpinned program development. With ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Sustainability in the Curriculum

  • Red Rocks Community College (CO)

Red Rocks Community College has made a commitment to the national challenge of creating and sustaining a green workforce. In conjunction with our partners, the National Science Foundation, Colorado School ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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A Home for Sustainable Engineering: A Living-Learning Cohort

  • Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology (IN)

If promoting sustainability across the curriculum presents one set of logistical and conceptual challenges, and reducing a campus's environmental footprint presents another, surely integrating the two constitutes its own ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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We to Me: Identifying the Ecological Self in Post-secondary Sustainability Curriculum

  • Seneca Polytechnic (ON)

Post-secondary students have become skilled purveyors of the fundamentals of good sustainability. Beginning with their early years in pre-school, they are trained to memorize and recite key concepts of the ...

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Fostering change agents for sustainability

  • Tufts University (MA)

Graduate work on the effectiveness of a social psychology-based, experiential learning course on generating undergraduate civic leaders in sustainability behavior change is described. This presentation outlines the structure of the ...

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Campus as a Learning, Living Laboratory for Sustainability

  • University of Arizona (AZ)

At the 2006 AASHE national conference, University of Arizona (UA) student Emilie Brill-Duisberg received the Student Sustainability Leadership Award for her work on implementing campus water harvesting projects which grew ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Practice, Professional Societies, and the Future of University Sustainability Education

  • University of Arizona (AZ)

This presentation discusses a new and novel direction for sustainability education taken by the University of Arizona's recently launched Practice School of Sustainability. Sustainability certificate programs have proliferated in ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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The End of Nature: Creating Sustainability Curriculum for Every Major

  • University of Cincinnati (OH)

This session will begin with the presentation of the sustainability course developed for the University of Cincinnati as a collaboration between the University and design and consulting firm, emersion DESIGN ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Creating a Sustainable Future: Mind, Heart, Behavioral Change, Resilience

  • University of Colorado Boulder (CO)

We are all, to greater or lesser extents, consumers of food, water, energy, goods, services, and creators of byproducts. The collective impact and global reach of our consumptive habits is ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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The Greening of an Intensive English Program

  • University of Colorado Boulder (CO)

Our poster discusses what sustainability is and why we include environmental topics in our English as a Second Language curriculum. We explain our new summer certificate program focusing on sustainable ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Creation of Interdisciplinary Sustainability Undergraduate Curriculum

  • University of Colorado Denver - Anschutz Medical Campus (CO)

The University of Colorado Denver initiated a faculty led signature area in sustainability to explore the potential of either a major or minor in sustainability. This PowerPoint presentation will cover ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Sustainable E-Waste Education and Research

  • University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (IL)

This presentation provides a review of two recent electronic waste (e-waste) education and research initiatives as part of a Sustainable Electronics Initiative at the University of Illinois Sustainable Technology Center ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Sustainability Internship Course Best Posters

  • University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (MN)

In a Sustainability Internship course offered at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities campus, students designed posters telling the story of their experiences interning at non-profits, local government offices, businesses ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Sustainability Internship: Developing a Sustainable Design Document for the University of Minnesota

  • University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (MN)

Sustainability requires collaboration. The University of Minnesota's Sustainability Studies minor internship promotes collaboration between students and professionals to work together to further sustainable efforts. My specific assignment was with ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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University of Northern Colorado Environmental Studies Club

  • University of Northern Colorado (CO)

In the 21st century, awareness and activism regarding environmental topics has become increasingly important. This is especially true on university campuses within the United States and worldwide where faculty and ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Teaching Sustainability: Effects on Teacher Candidates, Urban Students, & Cooperating Teachers

  • University of Scranton (PA)

Teaching Sustainability: Effects on Teacher Candidates, Urban Students, & Cooperating Teachers

This research project explored the reciprocal benefits of adding an integrated service-learning component to a required reading/language arts ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Thinking Globally, Acting Locally: A Global Sustainability Minor for UVA

  • University of Virginia (VA)

The sustainability movement is gaining traction at the University of Virginia. The emergence in recent years of new student groups, courses, faculty interest and events centered on sustainability show us ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Service-Learning in the Classroom

  • Ursinus College (PA)

One pedagogical method of integrating sustainability into the classroom is through service-learning. A service-learning partnership was created between an upper-level environmental studies climate change class at Ursinus College (UC) and ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Boundary Crossing, Experiential Learning, and Sustainable Agriculture at Virginia Tech

  • Virginia Tech (VA)

A diverse team of faculty, staff, students, and community partners collaborated to conceptualize, develop, and propose undergraduate curriculum for a transdisciplinary and experiential-based Civic Agriculture and Food Systems (CAFS) Minor ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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A Case Study on furthering Campus Sustainability by Smart Scheduling General Purpose Classrooms

  • West Virginia University (WV)

Today, higher education across the United States continues to use inefficient processes to schedule classrooms and events. Very little attention is given to optimal space allocation or usage efficiency. However ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Strategies for "Greening" the General Education Curriculum

  • West Virginia University at Parkersburg (WV)

Strategies will be provided with goals, objectives, and activities for "greening" the general education curriculum. This infusion approach results in a paradigm shift in student behaviors related to sustainable energy ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Redefining the possible: Community engagement, operational congruency and curriculum integration at York University

  • York University

York University, one of Canada's largest post-secondary institutions, is set in a rapidly changing region of urban Toronto. York has a deep commitment to social justice and environmental sustainability ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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The Sustainable Learning Community: The University of New Hampshire

  • University of New Hampshire (NH)

In this presentation, staff from the University of New Hampshire's University Office of Sustainability (UOS) -- the oldest endowed sustainability program in American higher education -- will share from their perspective ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Evaluating Fieldwork for Undergraduate Sustainability Education

  • University of Alberta (AB)

Many undergraduate instructors consider fieldwork as central to courses in sustainability and environmental studies. Common goals of fieldwork include the development of general and subject-specific skills, opportunity for experiential and ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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Engaging Students in Campus Sustainability Initiatives through Innovative Courses

  • Loyola University Chicago (IL)

Universities that strive to make their campuses more sustainable face challenges of curriculum reform and engaging their students in sustainability initiatives. At Loyola University Chicago (LUC), we are meeting both ...

  • Posted Feb. 26, 2016
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This tab provides access to data collected through AASHE’s Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System™ (STARS). STARS is a transparent, self-reporting framework for colleges and universities to measure their sustainability performance. STARS enables meaningful comparisons over time and across institutions using a common set of measurements developed with broad participation from the campus sustainability community.

All responses reference content from reports under the latest version of STARS, version 2.2. AASHE membership and log-in is required.

AC 1: Academic Courses

AC 2: Learning Outcomes

AC 3: Undergraduate Program

AC 4: Graduate Program

AC 5: Immersive Experience

AC 6: Sustainability Literacy Assessment

AC 7: Incentives for Developing Courses

AC 8: Campus as a Living Laboratory

Additional analysis on scores and quantitative fields can be conducted using the STARS Benchmarking Tool.

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