Tag: sustainable

  • How business school research can power inclusive and sustainable regional growth

    How business school research can power inclusive and sustainable regional growth

    This blog was kindly authored by Jack Harrington, CEO, Emma Parry, Chair and Katy Mason, President, British Academy of Management.

    Chartered ABS recently published its Business Schools as Engines of Growth report. This work provides a much needed look at the social and economic value of Business Schools. It paves the way for likely changes in the policy landscape.

    Here, we focus on why Business Schools are so well placed to deliver on so many policy priorities. Among other things, Business Schools are a channel through which social science research can change lives for the better.

    Business Schools across the UK are situated in very different kinds of regional economy. At a time of immense disruption – from climate shocks to technological transformation – our business schools must reimagine their role in helping shape the future of regional economies. The ‘Business Schools as Engines of Growth, Opportunity and Innovation’ report, published as a supplement to Universities UK’s 2024 Blueprint for Change, rightly positions business schools as more than excellent educators. Crucially, they are also strategic collaborators in place-based transformation, driving a new kind of socio-economic growth.

    The report calls to deepen research partnerships between business schools, local businesses, and policymakers. This is not just a question of economic necessity (though the productivity gap between UK regions remains stark). It is, most importantly, a question of social responsibility. We must place people and planet at the heart of our research agendas, building new understandings of inclusive, sustainable growth that reflect the urgent challenges of our time.

    From knowledge to impact: research that makes a difference

    Business and management research is often undervalued in national Research & Development debates. This is surprising, given it plays such a pivotal role in enabling the adoption and use of technical innovations as viable, scalable, and ethical elements of our everyday organisational practices and social lives. Research insights from UK business schools are already helping local firms adopt digital tools, improve leadership, decarbonise operations, and engage communities more inclusively.

    Programmes such as the Help to Grow: Management course, delivered by Small Business Charter-accredited schools, demonstrate how research-informed education can empower SME leaders to drive digital adoption and productivity. IPSOS evaluation shows 91% of participants report improved leadership and growth capabilities.

    This is just the tip of the iceberg. Research conducted through Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTPs), place-based innovation catalysts, accelerator and labs offers a roadmap for changing the way business schools can act as “anchor institutions” in their regions to drive positive change.

    A new narrative for business research

    If we are serious about creating a fairer economy and a more inclusive society, then the UK’s business schools and their research must be seen as essential infrastructure for inclusive and sustainable regional development.

    Fortunately, this is largely a matter of valuing what we already have. As the white paper shows, Business Schools often provide the most visible way in which the social sciences inform decision-making and operational life in organisations across the UK. Business Schools offer the networks, the expertise, and the commitment to act as coordinators between science, society, and markets, and the skills to drive the co-production of new kinds of knowledge and imaginaries for a better future.

    There is still more that business schools can do. We need to be much better at enabling and valuing interdisciplinary, engaged research that supports public and private sector leaders navigating complexity. We need to help early-career researchers to collaborate beyond the academy. And we need to rethink impact, not just as ‘REF returns’, but in terms of supporting the development of better jobs, fairer systems, and stronger communities.At a time when the Higher Education is in financial crisis, and the economy is struggling to grow, investment has never been so urgent.

    Source link

  • A Professor’s Framework for Meaningful, Joyful, and Sustainable Work – Faculty Focus

    A Professor’s Framework for Meaningful, Joyful, and Sustainable Work – Faculty Focus

    Source link

  • A Professor’s Framework for Meaningful, Joyful, and Sustainable Work – Faculty Focus

    A Professor’s Framework for Meaningful, Joyful, and Sustainable Work – Faculty Focus

    Source link

  • GEDU’s Kevin McCole on scaling sustainable development training

    GEDU’s Kevin McCole on scaling sustainable development training

    Over 70 delegates will travel to the UK to agree a comprehensive capacity building programme that will help achieve the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

    GEDU’s managing director for external relations and sustainability, Kevin McCole, is also the director of UNITAR’s London Centre, one of 33 Centres, spanning every continent.

    The mission of these Centres is to deliver training and capacity building across the SDGs. 

    The PIE News sat down with Kevin McCole to understand the work of the UNITAR network, GEDU’s particular priorities, and what will be achieved in the coming days in London. 

    Kevin, this sounds like a critical week for you and your colleagues. Can you tell us what will happen and why it matters?

    It is an important week. It’s exciting too. It’s not every day that a UK education business hosts a delegation led by an assistant UN secretary general and includes other senior UN officials, as well as business, academic and municipal leaders from around the world. It’s a truly global gathering.

    UNITAR and its network come together once a year, and part of the programme in London will be internal – we’ll share best practice, identify areas for collaboration in 2026, consider how UN 2.0 and the Pact for the Future will shape the UN’s development agenda beyond 2030, agree ambitious targets and how to achieve them.

    We’ve also got important external engagement too, including with representatives of the UK government, parliamentarians and businesses.

    While we are discussing global challenges, it’s important to focus on the local too. So we will be hosting the delegation at the Global Banking School campus in Greenford where we will engage local politicians and council officials.

    What role do universities play in the UNITAR network?

    Of the 33 Centres across the world, most are led by universities. In London next week there will be senior figures from York University in Canada, Newcastle University in Australia, and more from all continents in between.

    GEDU’s contribution to UNITAR is global too – it’s not limited to London. With 13 institutions across 15 countries – from Toronto and Tampa in the Americas, across Europe and the Middle East and India, to Brisbane in Asia-Pacific – we are able to bring a global perspective and have a global impact.

    Universities can help achieve the SDGs in a range of ways. Through their curricula and extra-curricula activity. Let’s take just three examples from GEDU institutions.

    MLA College recently launched 17 byte sized courses – one on every SDG – in partnership with UNITAR.

    Shiller International University, with campuses in Heidelberg, Paris, Madrid and Tampa offer the Seeds of Peace Scholarship to support students from conflict-affected regions.

    And ICN Business School, a triple accredited creative business school with campuses in Paris, Berlin and Nancy, is an active member of the United Nations Global Compact, the Principles for Responsible Management Education initiative, the Collectif pour l’Intégration de la Responsabilité Sociétale et du Développement Durable dans l’Enseignement Supérieur (CIRSES), and the Conférence des Grandes Écoles network on sustainable development

    Of course, universities can’t succeed in isolation. That’s why UNITAR’s general approach, and the specific programme in London, involve national and local governments, parliamentarians, businesses, and civil society. We all need to work together.

    We hear about sustainability a lot, but it’s more than just environmental, isn’t it?

    Yes, from the UN and UNITAR perspective we look at all 17 of the sustainable development goals.

    Many are environmental, for example climate action, life on land, life below water, and affordable and clean energy. But the SDGs also include peace, justice and strong institutions, reduced inequalities and eliminating poverty and hunger.

    So we have a broad and important agenda in London next week.

    It’s also important to say that the UNITAR programme is giving us at GEDU the opportunity to consider the contribution we can make collectively and as individual institutions.

    For instance, how do we best deploy our time and expertise to work in partnership with governments, businesses and NGOs around the world? 

    We understand GEDU will be making an announcement as well? 

    That’s correct. We’re going to release our inaugural GEDU sustainability report at an event in the House of Commons.

    The report will detail the work being done by all our institutions to address all of the SDGs, including in the SDG that they have adopted and lead on for GEDU. It will also outline our ambitions for 2026 and beyond.

    I have to say, preparing this report has been a real eye opener for me – I hadn’t realised just how much our institutions are doing that aligns to the SDGs. And it’s been really encouraging to learn that they all have ambition to contribute even more.

    About the author: Kevin McCole is GEDU managing director, external relations and sustainability. Kevin, who has a passion for education and international partnerships, joined GEDU Global Education in March 2025 and leads the group’s external relations, public relations and sustainability activities. Before joining GEDU Global Education, Kevin spent 16 years as managing director of the UK India Business Council, where he worked closely with governments and organisations in both countries on the UK-India FTA and, more broadly, to bring UK investors to India and strengthen the business, education and people-to-people links between India and the UK. Prior to this, Kevin spent 19 years in the UK’s diplomatic service, where he served in The Netherlands, Malta, Romania, India, and in various London postings. In India, Kevin spent three years at the British Deputy High Commission in Kolkata helping strengthen the UK’s partnership with East and North East India. 

    Source link

  • Civic 2.0 – the civic university agenda but with sustainable impact

    Civic 2.0 – the civic university agenda but with sustainable impact

    Given the likely media habits of Wonkhe’s astute and cerebral readership, you’ve probably had a good fill of Andy Haldane in recent days.

    The former chief economist of the Bank of England has hardly been off the news and current affairs shows. First describing the pre-budget speculation as a “fiscal fandango,” and then continuing his sharp critique by lamenting the prospects for economic growth following the announcement last week.

    Haldane is best known for his economic analysis but as the author of the Levelling Up white paper (RIP) he is also a thoughtful commentator on all things related to “place” and has taken a keen interest in the civic university agenda. If you are not feeling too over-saturated with Haldane content, it is worth revisiting his essay for the Kerslake Collection last year. In it he celebrated the impact of the civic movement within the sector and the great practice it has fostered, but politely pointed out that the Civic University Commission that Lord Kerslake chaired, and its aftermath, had very little impact on policy.

    A place to call home

    This government, like the last one, has often spoken about the importance of place. Whether we think of geographical inequality or “left behind places,” across the political spectrum it is recognised that this complex issue is behind much of the political instability we have seen over the last decade. When it comes to why this matters Cabinet Office minister Josh Simmons put it well the other day when he said “Everything we do in policy should focus on place. We all experience the world through where we live and who we live with.”

    Policy action has not always matched the rhetoric but to be fair to this government, while critics may argue there is a lack of much needed radicalism when it comes to place, there have been a range of welcome place-based initiatives announced during the budget and over the last few months including the Pride in Place strategy, place-based budget pilots, and local economic growth zones.

    For higher education policy specifically, the government has of course included civic engagement as one of its five priorities and the industrial strategy highlights universities as “engines of innovation and skills” that are key to driving economic growth. Nevertheless, it is fair to say that civic engagement is a priority the Whitehall machine is struggling to get to grips with. Universities are inherently policy-domain-spanning institutions – and yet policy ownership of their “civic mission” is restricted to one Whitehall department (Education), where the much more expansive role of universities in driving economic and social growth within their cities and regions is not considered alongside their role in skills and education.

    It is not just the fact universities are often thought of as “big schools” by government which limits their role in place-based policymaking, but, as the National Civic Impact Accelerator (NCIA)/Civic University Network outlined recently there is a “profound fragmentation in both policy and place.” The siloed nature of government departments adds complexity and can limit ambition and potential for unlocking the role of universities in supporting their place. As the NCIA report outlines, the different layers of devolution also presents a fragmented landscape in which universities work.

    Civic 2.0

    So, what can we do about it? Following the NCIA programme we want to build on the success they have had in developing great practice in the sector. We are delighted that the National Co-ordinating Centre for Public Engagement has agreed to host the Civic University Network, convene a national community of practice, and maintain the assets of the Civic University Network and National Civic Impact Accelerator. This ensures continuity for the sector and provides a platform for sharing knowledge and accelerating civic leadership.

    In addition to sector-practice we want to start making a difference to policy and overcoming the Haldane critique! A group of universities and funders – the universities of Birmingham, Newcastle and Queen Mary alongside Midlands Innovation and the NCCPE – have got together to establish a programme to develop policies and ideas which would enable universities’ place-based role to grow.

    We are at the start of this journey but our intended approach is to be both ambitious and pragmatic. What this means in reality is that we do not anticipate a radical departure from the current system in the near or medium term. While we recognise the higher education market and the way research is funded is often at odds with the place agenda, the fiscal environment and challenges faced by government means there is little appetite for structural change.

    Instead, we want to identify significant themes universities could play a role in tackling, such as social cohesion and rebuilding institutional capacity in local communities, as well as a small number of policy shifts or ideas across different parts of Whitehall to ensure universities are enabled to be more active players in supporting local growth and civic engagement over the next few years.

    In turn this will also help us to provide the sector with additional momentum, leadership and representation on the civic/place agenda – ensuring greater visibility, highlighting excellent practice, developing spokespeople and case-studies for policy makers to engage with and to facilitate partnerships between university leaders, other sectors and national/ regional policymakers.

    We are starting out as a small group of universities and funders committed to the civic agenda, but we recognise there are many other institutions from across the country with different missions and specialisms who really care about the role they play in the places they are part of.

    We would welcome you to join our programme, with the intention that over time we will be able to build a sustainable entity which wouldn’t just look at “civic wins” for the medium term but could also explore the system changes we need to better serve our places for the decades to come.

    More information on the Civic 2.0 programme can be found here.

    Source link

  • The promise and challenge of AI in building a sustainable future

    The promise and challenge of AI in building a sustainable future

    It is tempting to regard AI as a panacea for addressing our most urgent global challenges, from climate change to resource scarcity. Yet the truth is more complex: unless we pair innovation with responsibility, the very tools designed to accelerate sustainability may exacerbate its contradictions.

    A transformative potential

    Let us first acknowledge how AI is already reshaping sustainable development. By mapping patterns in vast datasets, AI enables us to anticipate environmental risks, optimise resource flows and strengthen supply chains. Evidence suggests that by 2030, AI systems will touch the lives of more than 8.5 billion people and influence the health of both human and natural ecosystems in ways we have never seen before. Research published in Nature indicates that AI could support progress towards 79% of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), helping advance 134 specific targets. Yet the same research also cautions that AI may impede 59 of those targets if deployed without care or control.

    In practice, this means smarter energy grids that balance load and demand, precision agriculture that reduces fertiliser waste and environmental monitoring systems that detect deforestation or pollution in real time. For a planet under pressure, these scenarios offer hope to do less harm and build more resilience.

    The hidden costs

    Even so, we must confront the shadows cast by AI’s advancements. An investigation published earlier this year warns that AI systems could account for nearly half of global data-centre power consumption before the decade’s end. Consider the sheer scale: vast server arrays, intensive cooling systems, rare-earth mining and water-consuming infrastructure all underpin generative AI’s ubiquity. Worse still, indirect carbon emissions tied to major AI-capable firms reportedly rose by 150% between 2020 and 2023. In short, innovation meant to serve sustainability imposes a growing ecological burden.

    Navigating trade-offs

    This tension presents an essential question: how can we reconcile AI’s promise with its cost? Scholars warn that we must move beyond the assumption that ‘AI for good’ is always good enough. The moment demands a new discipline of ‘sustainable AI’: a framework that treats resource use, algorithmic bias, lifecycle impact and societal equity as first-order concerns.

    Practitioners must ask not only what AI can do, but how it is built, powered, governed and retired. Efficiency gains that drive consumption higher will not deliver sustainability; they may merely escalate resource demands in disguise.

    A moral and strategic imperative

    For educators, policymakers and business leaders, this is more than a technical issue; it is a moral and strategic one. To realise AI’s true potential in advancing sustainable development, we must commit to three priorities:

    Energy and resource transparency: Organisations must measure and report the footprint of their AI models, including data-centre use, water cooling, e-waste and supply-chain impacts. Transparency is foundational to accountability.

    Ethical alignment and fairness: AI must be trained and deployed with due regard to bias, social impact and inclusivity. Its benefits must not reinforce inequality or externalise environmental harms onto vulnerable communities.

    Integrative education and collaboration: We need multidisciplinary expertise, engineers fluent in ecology, ethicists fluent in algorithms and managers fluent in sustainability. Institutions must upskill young learners and working professionals to orient AI within the broader context of planetary boundaries and human flourishing.

    MLA College’s focus and contribution

    At MLA College, we recognise our role in equipping professionals at this exact intersection. Our programs emphasise the interrelationship between technology, sustainability and leadership. Graduates of distance-learning and part-time formats engage with the complexities of AI, maritime operations, global sustainable development and marine engineering by bringing insight to sectors vital to the planet’s future.

    When responsibly guided, AI becomes an amplifier of purpose rather than a contraption of risk. Our challenge is to ensure that every algorithm, model and deployment contributes to regenerative systems, not extractive ones.

    The promise of AI is compelling: more accurate climate modelling, smarter cities, adaptive infrastructure and just-in-time supply chains. But the challenge is equally formidable: rising energy demands, resource-intensive infrastructures and ungoverned expansion.

    When responsibly guided, AI becomes an amplifier of purpose rather than a contraption of risk

    Our collective role, as educators and practitioners, is to shape the ethical architecture of this era. We must ask whether our technologies will serve humanity and the environment or simply accelerate old dynamics under new wrappers.

    The verdict will not be written on lines of code or boardroom decisions alone. It will be inscribed in the fields that fail to regenerate, in the communities excluded from progress, in the data centres humming with waste and in the next generation seeking meaning in technology’s promise.

    About the author: Professor Mohammad Dastbaz is the principal and CEO of MLA College, an international leader in distance and sustainability-focused higher education. With over three decades in academia, he has held senior positions including deputy vice-chancellor at the University of Suffolk and pro vice-chancellor at Leeds Beckett University.

    A Fellow of the British Computer Society, the Higher Education Academy, and the Royal Society of Arts, Professor Dastbaz is a prominent researcher and author in the fields of sustainable development, smart cities, and digital innovation in education.

    His latest publication, Decarbonization or Demise – Sustainable Solutions for Resilient Communities (Springer, 2025), brings together cutting-edge global research on sustainability, climate resilience, and the urgent need for decarbonisation. The book builds on his ongoing commitment to advancing the UN Sustainable Development Goals through education and research.

    At MLA College, Professor Dastbaz continues to lead transformative learning initiatives that combine academic excellence with real-world impact, empowering students to shape a sustainable future.

    Source link

  • New HEPI and University of London Report: Rethinking Placement: Increasing Clinical Placement Efficacy for a Sustainable NHS Future

    New HEPI and University of London Report: Rethinking Placement: Increasing Clinical Placement Efficacy for a Sustainable NHS Future

    Author:
    Professor Amanda Broderick and Robert Waterson

    Published:

    The NHS faces a growing clinical placement crisis that threatens the future of its workforce. A new HEPI and University of London report calls for bold, system-wide reform to ensure students get the real-world experience they need to deliver safe, high-quality care.

    HEPI and the University of London’s new report, Rethinking Placement: Increasing Clinical Placement Efficacy for a Sustainable NHS Future, which has been published with the support of the Council for Deans of Health, warns that the NHS cannot meet its ambitious workforce goals without bold reform of how students gain real-world experience. Co-authored by Professor Amanda Broderick and Robert Waterson of the University of East London, the report calls for a shift from simply creating more placements to delivering better ones—equitable, flexible, digitally enabled and aligned with the future of healthcare.

    Drawing on innovation across London and beyond, the authors propose practical steps including simulation-based learning, new supervision frameworks and community-based models that can expand capacity without compromising quality. With over 106,000 vacancies across secondary care, the report urges policymakers, universities and NHS providers to act now to secure a sustainable, skilled and compassionate workforce for the next decade and beyond.

    You can read the press release and access the full report here.

    Source link

  • New HEPI Debate Paper: Higher Education for a Sustainable Economy

    New HEPI Debate Paper: Higher Education for a Sustainable Economy

    Author:
    Professor Tim Blackman

    Published:

    Too many students studying full-time honours degrees at university are causing higher education to be ‘over-consumed’.

    A Call for Radical Reform: Higher Education for a Sustainable Economy by Professor Tim Blackman argues that full-time honours degrees were created when universities were small and elite institutions. They were rolled over into the modern mass system of higher education we have today, with little thought about the appropriateness and affordability of providing such a large volume of learning straight after school, with the educational content expected to last a lifetime.

    Instead, Professor Tim Blackman says more people need to be studying shorter courses, spreading the cost over time while encouraging lifelong updating of skills and knowledge.

    You can read the press release and access the full report here.

    Source link

  • How can schools launch sustainable drone programs?

    How can schools launch sustainable drone programs?

    This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.

    Dive Brief:

    • Learning how to use a drone can help students develop hands-on STEM skills such as programming while also fostering interpersonal skills like collaboration and resilience, experts said.
    • However, for these programs to be sustainable at the middle and high school levels, educators must ensure they connect drone usage to real-world scenarios, collaborate with local business and government agencies, and make the curriculum engaging beyond the first year of instruction, educators said.
    • “Drones are used in so many industries now. It’s no longer just trying to build a robot arm, they’re being used in police work, agriculture, space, construction work, etc.,” said Louann Cormier, senior program manager of aerial drone competition at the Robotics Education & Competition Foundation. She encourages educators to simply “take the leap” if they are interested in incorporating drones into their classrooms.

    Dive Insight:

    For a sustainable and effective drone program, educators need to connect with students and demonstrate that this technology can be applied in the real world, said David Thesenga, a middle school science teacher at Dawson School, a private school in Colorado. 

    Cormier noted how learning with drones can open students’ eyes to pathways they hadn’t considered before.

    “There’s so many industries where [students] don’t think of STEM or they don’t think of technology, but now all of a sudden they do, and it just opened up opportunities to them,” said Cormier. “The more that you can connect with them on their own interest levels or something that they find fascinating, that’s your entry point.”

    Drones can be an expensive undertaking, Thesenga said, but schools don’t need to buy top-of-the-line drones. It’s actually about balance, explained Cormier, because cheap drones are not a great option either — they tend to break more easily and have function issues.  

    Cormier encourages districts to start with an entry-level educational drone, because they are safe and don’t require any sort of certification to use. A sustainable drone program also requires a good teacher or coach who’s invested in it, who’s going to stick around for a while and think about how this is done, Thesenga said

    Going beyond the classroom and training students for drone competitions can also make the program more sustainable long-term. Students not only get excited, but it also gives them something to strive for, Cormier said.

    Competitions also help educators give a focus to instruction. For beginning educators who may not know what to cover, the competition aspect includes specific tasks, and the curriculum aligns with what they’ll be judged on. It provides a pathway to start, and from there, educators become more confident and comfortable and can progress into instructing on other areas of the drone industry.

    A sustainable drone program also needs to keep students engaged as they progress through the different school levels, said Jenn DeBarge-Goonan, executive vice president of communications for Rocket Social Impact, which works with companies and nonprofits to develop social impact programs. 

    DeBarge-Goonan said that making sure there’s a new challenge each year as the program evolves ensures that a student in year three is not doing the same thing they did in years one and two.

    There are several ways to fund these programs, Thesenga and Cormier noted. When looking at grants, Thesenga highlighted that they are often not specifically drone-related. However, schools can fund drone programs through general classroom grants or education tech grants.

    Cormier recommends reaching out to local organizations that utilize drones, as they are typically invested in the expansion of drone usage and need people in their labor pipeline.

    Source link

  • U.S. Higher Ed’s Investment in Sustainable Development Lags

    U.S. Higher Ed’s Investment in Sustainable Development Lags

    Colleges and universities in the United States lag behind their peers around the globe in working toward the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals—including ending poverty and hunger, climate action, and expanding access to education—according to the Times Higher Education Impact Rankings 2025, published today.

    The Trump administration’s financial and political attacks on higher education, as well as more pressing problems across the sector, mean it’s unlikely U.S. colleges will prioritize sustainability work in the near future.

    While seven Canadian universities—including Queen’s University, McMaster University and the University of Alberta—ranked in the global top 50, Arizona State University, ranked joint sixth, is the only U.S.-based institution to crack the top 50. Three highly ranked U.S. colleges fell out of the global top 50 this year: Michigan State University is now at joint 61st, Penn State at joint 64th and Florida International University at joint 71st.

    Western Sydney University in Australia topped the global ranking for the fourth year in a row.

    THE—Inside Higher Ed’s parent company—ranked the sustainability efforts of 2,526 universities from 130 countries; 52 institutions from across the U.S. participated in the 2025 ranking, down from 58 in 2024.

    Since 2019, THE has evaluated the performance of thousands of higher education institutions across the globe on the U.N.’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Universities that want to participate in the rankings are required to submit information for SDG 17, Partnerships and Goals, and at least three other SDGs. How well an institution meets those goals is then evaluated across four broad categories: research, stewardship, outreach and teaching.

    Phil Baty, chief global affairs officer for THE, described American universities’ “general lack of direct engagement with the SDGs” as “disappointing,” especially because the U.S. has some of the world’s strongest research universities. “I’d hope they can turn their greatest minds more overtly towards tackling the world’s most pressing and urgent challenges.”

    Under Trump, SDGs May Be ‘More Risky’

    Although the nation’s lackluster showing in the 2025 Impact Rankings is based on university data that predates the start of President Donald Trump’s second term, the administration’s attacks on the sector and political stances suggest the country’s higher education institutions may only face more barriers to becoming global sustainability leaders.

    In March, the Trump administration denounced the SDGs, which the U.N. created in 2015 during President Barack Obama’s administration with the aim of reaching them by 2030. The second Trump administration has also pulled out of other international sustainability initiatives, including the Paris Agreement on climate change, and moved to cut billions in funding for scientific research and social programs—including many focused on reducing social inequities, addressing climate change and advancing diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.

    Bryan Alexander, a scholar who studies the future of higher education and author of 2023’s Universities on Fire: Higher Education in the Age of Climate Crisis, wrote in an email to Inside Higher Ed that even before the Trump administration’s denouncement of the SDGs, they’d failed to gain much traction among U.S. universities.

    “When I mention SDGs in academic settings, I usually see blank faces and have to explain what they are,” he wrote, attributing the indifference to a stronger focus on other, seemingly more pressing matters plaguing higher education, such as financial instability. “That sense of institutional urgency, heightened by a steady stream of campuses closing, merging, or cutting programs and staff, looms large. In that context, the SDG goals look like noble but not essential, nice-to-haves rather than imperatives.”

    According to Alexander, other deterrents to the sector launching a widespread commitment to sustainable development include faculty burnout, scarce resources, anti-expert animus, doubts from faculty and administrators that their efforts will make a difference, and anxiety about associated political risks.

    And he expects all those problems to persist, if not worsen, in the coming years as Trump continues his assault on universities and pro-sustainability initiatives. “The anti-DEI campaign strikes directly at several SDGs,” Alexander wrote. “It will be harder for academics to win external support for any such work, from doing research to offering new academic programs, overhauling a campus power system to replacing vehicles with electric vehicles. It will appear to be politically even more risky.”

    However, he said there are some less risky actions U.S. institutions can take to be more sustainable.

    “First, renewable energy, especially solar, is simply cheaper than fossil fuels. Switching a campus’ power supply just makes financial sense,” he said. “Second, traditional-age undergraduates are much more interested in climate change and sustainable development than their elders, which means they will tend to be eager to take classes and study in programs along those lines.”

    Walking a Fine Line

    ASU also tops the global ranking for SDG 14: Life Below Water, which means it’s at the forefront of developing strategies that support the health and sustainability of aquatic ecosystems.

    It launched one of the nation’s first schools of sustainability nearly 20 years ago, and although its main campus is located in the Arizona desert, ASU launched the School of Ocean Futures in 2024. The school connects research and teaching facilities in the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans with research happening on its main campus in Tempe.

    The school is one example of how universities can help to “restore balance within the global environment,” said Marc Campbell, ASU’s assistant vice president of sustainability and deputy chief sustainability officer.

    “Fundamentally, the work of sustainability is about trying to be more efficient in the use of our resources and trying to protect what’s out there,” Campbell said. “A lot of people can support the foundational work of sustainability, but we need to unload some of the baggage that’s associated with the word and the discipline.”

    Doing that, he said, will come from making a case for the economic and social value of investing in sustainable development initiatives.

    “In any organization there are supporters and detractors. You have to figure out how to walk that fine line to get people supporting the greater good and recognizing what that is,” Campbell said.

    “When we can do that more effectively across the board and build broader collaborative partnerships with other organizations that are focused on the same goals, then I think we can get past some of the [political] baggage.”

    Source link