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To address deficiencies in STEM and sustainability in business management and intra-university curricula, we developed and implemented an interdisciplinary STEM-based sustainability curriculum at a university in the Western United States. Six classes participated in curricular efforts including in-person and online sections of a business management course, in-person and online sections of a general elective STEM course, and a matched control course for each ( n = 214). We systematically designed, developed, and implemented curricular interventions—multi-week STEM-based business sustainability modules—using the case teaching method. A comprehensive evaluation with pre- and post-tests was conducted to assess student sustainability cognition and affect. Significant results emerged for sustainability cognition including the environmental, social, and economic dimensions of sustainability. Counterintuitively, student sustainability affect did not improve. However, sustainability cognition and affect were significantly correlated on the post-test for treatment students, an indication that cognitive and affective changes share the same directionality. Discussion, implications, limitations, and future research directions are provided.
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Six Dimensions of Sustainability: A Framework for Organizing Diverse University Sustainability Curricula at The Ohio State University
Integrating sustainability into university curricula brings diverse challenges and conflicts as separate units vie for ownership of courses and topics. This case study presents a six dimensions sustainability framework developed at The Ohio State University to organize curricula under an inclusive strategy. An interdisciplinary group of faculty focused on sustainability education engaged in a three-phased process including review of sustainability definitions from diverse disciplines; analysis of key aspects of the definitions in conjunction with course descriptions and learning outcomes; and identification of commonalities across the key aspects. This yielded six foundational dimensions of sustainability which serve as a means to assess curricular contributions across University units and topics. The six dimensions framework has been used in practice in multiple contexts. The six dimensions framework provides a way to identify and foster diverse sustainability curricula efforts. It has enabled academic units to describe their disciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives on diverse sustainability topics and the University to advance a broad sustainability vision. The six dimensions framework provides a novel “big tent” approach to integration of sustainability into higher education curricula. The framework provides guidance about what counts as sustainability while maintaining the breadth that widens participation.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1922666
- PAR ID:
- 10631838
- Publisher / Repository:
- Emerald Publishing Limited
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education
- Volume:
- 25
- Issue:
- 9
- ISSN:
- 1467-6370
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 316 - 332
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSHE-08-2023-0344
