‘Embed’ green issues into course content, says NUS rep

Asking academics to incorporate ecological issues into their teaching will do far more to improve environmental awareness than just offering modules on sustainability, experts say.

While some universities allow undergraduates to take a credit-bearing module on the environment, this approach is less effective than more fundamental transformation of curricula seen elsewhere, said Joanna Romanowicz, international programmes manager (sustainability) at the UK’s National Union of Students, where she leads the Horizon 2020 Student Switch Off project to deliver energy savings across Europe.

Instead, universities should ask educators to include green issues in their course content and force students to consider waste, consumption and other environmental issues in the context of their subject, said Ms Romanowicz, who will address the “greening of comprehensive internationalisation” alongside sustainability experts from France, Australia and New Zealand in a session at the European Association for International Education’s annual conference on 25 September.

Teaching in all subjects – from languages and history to dentistry – could be adapted, Ms Romanowicz explained. “Introducing an environment element to curricula in dentistry has raised many issues from diet and smoking and the profession’s use of mercury,” she said. “Some universities have gone for environment modules which are optional, but embedding these issues in curricula is much more effective.”

According to Unesco, 80 per cent of political and industry leaders were graduates, although just 3 per cent of people globally were, Ms Romanowicz said. “If we want to make sure the leaders of tomorrow are equipped with the skills and values to address our environmental crisis, we need to make fundamental changes.”

Potential green reforms to university leadership, student mobility and institutional collaborations will also be discussed at the Ignite session of lighting keynotes, which will be chaired by Scott Blair, the Paris-based director of assessment and sustainability at the American Council of Education, a US study-abroad provider.

Encouraging scholars to publish environmental-­influenced research related to their discipline could expand the green agenda, Dr Blair argued.

“Faculty might not bother publishing anything like this as it would probably appear in a journal outside their discipline and not count towards promotion,” noted Dr Blair, who said such publications “should count as much as any other paper”.

Incentivising academics to teach environmental themes whatever their discipline was also vital, he argued.

“Even if you were teaching poetry, you could introduce students to Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring and ask them to do a textual analysis of her language,” he said of the US conservationist’s seminal 1962 science book. “We, as higher education professionals, are failing if we are teaching behaviour which is deleterious to the planet,” he ­concluded.

jack.grove@timeshighereducation.com