Sustainability At Carleton

Suzanne Savanick
Carleton College

Summary

This class will focus on the concept of sustainability: What is sustainability? What is sustainability in practice? What does sustainability mean to Carleton? As a main project, the class will create potential sustainability principals for Carleton and present these principals to the Carleton community for Campus Sustainability Day on October 25th. By focusing on Carleton, we will be able to apply the concept of sustainability to a real world institution. In addition, students will be able to describe energy and materials flows through an institution and articulate a sustainability vision for an institution.


Course Size:
less than 15

Course Context:

This course is a required junior colloquium for environmental studies students. The topic changes depending on the instructor teaching the course.

Course Goals:

- To enable students to apply the concepts of sustainability to a real world institution.
- To recognize how sustainability is applied in practice
- To recognize and influence how sustainability is applied at Carleton
- Enable student to critique current sustainability vision statements
- Enable students to communicate a new sustainability vision statement for the college that has the potential for adoption
- Enable students to articulate what sustainability means for them.
Secondary Goals
- Develop communication skills
- Elicit feedback from stakeholders
- Work effectively in groups

Assessment:

The course is offered on a pass/fail basis. One of the reasons for the public display of their work is to keep the interest of the students (as well as having them work on a real-world project).

Syllabus:

Syllabus (Microsoft Word 58kB Sep18 06)

Teaching Materials:



References and Notes:

Uhl, Christopher, 2004, Developing Ecological Conciousness: Path to a sustainable world, Rowman & Littlefield: Oxford, UK.

Edwards, Andres, 2005, The Sustainability Revolution: Portrait of a paradigm shift, New Society Publishers: Gabriola Island, BC.