Environmental sustainability in higher education: What do academics think?

Abstract

The slow uptake of Education for Sustainability (EfS) curricula in universities has, partly, been attributed to academics’ perceptions that EfS has little relevance within some disciplines. Understanding teaching academics’ attitudes, values and experiences of EfS across disciplines can inform future EfS efforts in higher education. This paper presents one part of a larger study that sought the views of ≈6% of the entire university teaching workforce of Australia. One quarter of the teaching academics in every discipline of every Australian university (except one) (n = 38) was sent an online questionnaire asking for their opinions of EfS. Precisely, 1819 academics participated (26% response rate) and data was analysed with descriptive and inferential statistics. The findings suggest that academics are supportive of EfS for all university students. Support, perceived relevance and reported difficulties with EfS are discipline specific; academics would respond positively to EfS framed within their disciplinary worldviews.

Keywords:

• lecturer
• attitudes
• university
• multidisciplinary
• ESD

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank our respondents to the questionnaire and all those who offered their assistance during the recruitment process. We would like to thank the delegates and the organisers of the seventh World Environmental Education Congress, Marrakech, Morocco 2013, where this paper was first presented. We would also like to thank our colleagues in the School of Life and Environmental Sciences discussion group, Hannah Pusey, and three anonymous referees, for their attentive revisions and suggestions. Thanks also to Associate Professor Ian Thomas for his guidance. The contribution of these people greatly improved this work. We are grateful for the support of Deakin University’s School of Life and Environmental Sciences, the Environmental Sustainability Research Group, and the Faculty of Science, Engineering and Built Environment for funding the research. This study was conducted under a Deakin University Human Ethics permit (2010-248).

Notes

1. The study involved any academic with teaching duties, rather than academics who chose to employ lecturing as their sole teaching method. Therefore for the purposes of this study the term 'teaching academic' rather than 'lecturer' has been used as it more accurately describes the intended participants of the study and is a more inclusive term.