ID272 The Sustainable University

The Idea

There have been many strategic ideas submitted looking at different aspects of sustainability but still situated within a broader ‘business as usual’ framing of the university. This idea asks the university to boldly explore what a truly ‘sustainable university’ looks like, with a ‘sustainability purpose’ at its core. For Keele to be known as a university of something (sustainability) rather than of somewhere. 

In the context of this idea, ‘sustainability’ covers the environmental, social, and economic pillars of sustainability, and can be broadly understood as covering the breadth of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, therefore stretching across equality, work, and poverty to more narrow framings of sustainability around ‘environmental’ issues. Sustainability should be understood as the union of these different issues, with a clear need for every discipline and every role. Sustainability is about systems change, not (just) technological patches. 

This idea is therefore to boldly position the university as THE ‘sustainable university’, with every aspect of its operations and activity focused on progress towards a sustainable world, in contrast to an approach that ‘embeds’ sustainability into existing operations. A university where sustainability IS what we do, not just how we do it. It IS the university’s purpose. This requires a bold repositioning and cultural shift across the entire organisation, this will take time, it will take significant cultural change, and it will require the input and engagement of every single member of the Keele community. 

Keele has made much progress as a sustainable university, but sustainability is far from being fully embedded across every aspect of the institution and the institutions’ culture, never mind being at the centre of the university's purpose. In a truly sustainable university, every member of staff feels themselves to be a member of a community working towards this purpose, helping bridge divides and developing a truly collaborative culture and community, irrespective of role. A sustainable future is the only future..

Why This Idea Should Be Considered

Keele already has a strong sustainability reputation in the sector, winning various accolades including Global Sustainability Institution of the Year in 2021. Anecdotal evidence suggests that staff and students are drawn to Keele because of our sustainability reputation, yet there is a sense from established staff of weakened organisational commitment, activity and culture around sustainability, and a reliance on sustainability narratives around (the impressive) sustainable energy developments and specific subject developments. Anecdotally, for  some new students, Keele as a sustainable university does not quite live up to its sustainability promise. At the same time, across the UK higher education sector, there is an acceleration of sustainability activity in other higher education institutions. For example, the goals of the University of Birmingham’s new ‘Birmingham Institute for Sustainability and Climate Action’ include ensuring that their sustainability research, engagement and impact is woven throughout the University’s Strategic Framework, promoting “sustainability at the heart”, that the sustainability agenda is raised within and beyond the university, that stakeholders are convened to inform action on climate change and to influence policy, practice and funding landscapes, and that business are supported. To advance the Sustainable Development Goals. 

While this acceleration of activity elsewhere should be applauded and welcomed, it means that Keele’s sustainability USP, where we have punched above our weight nationally and internationally for several years, becomes ever weaker. The bold approach outlined here builds on our existing reputation and creates a genuine shift for the sector and a model of what a genuine ‘sustainable university’ looks like, creating genuine distinctiveness within a stretched and competitive sector, with implications to reputation, recruitment and retention.

How We Would Implement This Idea

Implementation is a long game. It starts with a clearly stated purpose, understanding current practices, followed by consistent high level communication of sustainability purpose-focused expectations, supported by appropriate governance structures that delegate responsibility and ensure accountability through monitoring and reporting, supported by training and support and structures to promote collaboration and communication, and blended and innovative finance models that bring together different funding streams blending research funding, commercial partnerships, philanthropic funding, public sector decarbonisation funding, lottery funding and regional funding opportunities as well as directing internal funding to support the changes needed. It requires different areas of the university to develop appropriate solutions and approaches to meet the university’s new focused purpose. It requires quality processes developed around a sustainability purpose and decision-making processes ensuring sustainability at their core. It requires consistency of purpose, and systemic, long-term thinking that goes beyond a five-year strategy, to strategy development tested against its impacts on future generations. 

What Success Would Look Like

A truly sustainable university with sustainability as its purpose would have the following attributes across five core pillars of activity: 

Education: Each programme designed to deliver to sustainable outcomes, integrating appropriate sustainability knowledge across the natural, physical and social sciences and arts and humanities. Employability focused on developing ‘moral ambition’ with a single employment focus on our graduates having the motivation and the skills to make a positive contribution to the world whether on environmental or social issues or their intersection. An educational ethos that helps our students develop into ‘changemakers’ with a sense of agency and purpose. Lifelong learning and CPD opportunities focused on delivering the green skills transition (green jobs are the fastest growing part of the economy) and ensuring the integration of social concerns into more technical environmental fields. Where learners develop sustainability thinking through the ‘formal curriculum’, the ‘informal curriculum’ through the opportunities available to them including societies embracing sustainability, and the ‘hidden curriculum’ - the learning that takes place from the campus environment in which our learners live, work and study. 

Research: Research activity focused on sustainability understanding and solutions, across a breadth of disciplinary areas, and with increasing emphasis and structures to support the inter and trans disciplinary research environments that sustainability challenges require. Research carried out in a sustainable way covering procurement, equipment sharing, waste and materials, data storage, travel, through to lab processes, underpinned by social and ethical considerations. Research training, from UG to PG, ensuring that our future researchers embed sustainable purpose and practice at the heart of their research. Research management and quality processes that ensure the above. 

Campus & operations: A built environment designed and managed to minimise carbon emissions and resource use, to utilise sustainable materials, be resilient to climate risk and ensure occupant wellbeing and help build community and belonging; a natural environment that supports biodiversity enhancement; a campus environment and accommodation that becomes a ‘learning tool’ from which staff, students and visitors can learn about practical sustainability solutions and is accessible to all. Catering that goes even further in blending health, wellbeing and environmental sustainability, making this the norm. Procurement processes that prioritise sustainability criteria. Finance through ethical banking and investment. Travel policies that promote and support slow travel. HR processes that set sustainability expectations from recruitment to performance review, while making work inclusive, accessible and supporting wellbeing 

Partnerships and outreach: A partnership approach where sustainability purpose is at the core of every collaboration, where Keele’s role as an anchor institution influences and inspires sustainability transition across its local region, and engages students and staff in supporting the local community, for example through energy advice centres learning from existing initiatives around legal advice. 

Leadership, governance and communication: High level communication that consistently messages sustainability as the university’s purpose and sustainable practice as expectation for all staff, students, and visitors. Transparent communication that acknowledges the tensions with achieving sustainability goals, where this is not yet achieved, and the future trajectory to sustainability. Governance that delegates responsibility and ensures accountability through monitoring and reporting, ensuring expectations in every School and Directorate. Risk management that takes threats from climate and nature loss as a serious risk to business continuity. Sustainability built effectively into all decision-making, and the natural world given a voice at decision making levels.