Are we modeling on campus the change we want to see in the world?

In October 2010, I gave a keynote lecture at the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) annual conference in Denver.

The conference theme was ‘Campus Initiatives to Catalyze a Just and Sustainable World’. Personally, I think universities are doing fairly well on ‘environmental’ sustainability, but as you might expect, I was constructively critical of their lack of progress on ‘just’ sustainability. For example, in my opening slide, I made this point about the latest compendium of activities from AASHE members, the AASHE Digest 2009:

AASHE Digest 2009, 380 pages, over 1250 stories and initiatives from nearly 600 institutions, 24 chapters and the word ‘justice’ appears 13 times…

Six times in relation to curricular matters; once in relation to a leadership center; once related to a book; once for a committee; once for a student coalition; twice for faculty jobs and once in an inauguration speech.

Are we modeling on campus the change we want to see in the world?

You can get a pdf of my presentation too:  http://www.aashe.org/files/documents/blog/AgyemanAASHE%202010.pdf

Let me know what you think?

Leave a Comment