Concordia University
IL-3: Sustainability Course Inventory

1. List of courses (“All courses” tab in excel file) 

Obtained a list of all courses offered between 2022 and 2025 (2022-23, 2023-24, 2024-25 academic years) from IITS. The original list included 22, 776 entries. IITS could not provide a complete list of all courses with their course descriptions, so a separate worksheet with course descriptions was provided and a manual cross-reference and merging of the two documents had to be conducted.  

2. Data cleaning 

a) Courses with multiple offerings were counted as one course. To remove courses with multiple offerings, duplicate course ID numbers were removed 

b) According to the STARS methodology, the following course types may be excluded at the institution’s discretion, as long as they are excluded from both the count of sustainability course offerings and the count of total courses: 

    Individually-directed courses (e.g., thesis, independent study, practicum) 

    Courses of four or fewer students 

    Special topics courses (e.g., courses that address emerging issues or specialized content and that are not offered on an ongoing basis) 

    Required courses for which the content is dictated by external bodies or legislation and not under institutional control (e.g., legally mandated courses on research ethics) 

    Courses that are strictly practice-oriented, e.g.: 

    Medical courses dedicated to clinical practice. 

    Arts courses dedicated to performance, technique, or composition. 

    Physical education courses that are activity-based. 

    Trades courses dedicated to hands-on learning or practice. 

To remove individually-directed courses, course titles were filtered using the following prompts and then manually scanned and removed if applicable: "Indepen", "Thesis", "Master". For courses that are strictly practice-oriented, course titles were filtered using the following prompts and then manually scanned and removed if applicable: "Composition", "Technique", "Painting", “Drawing”, and “Private Study”. There is potential to remove more courses that meet the criteria above. After removing individually-directed, practice-oriented and duplicate courses, the list was reduced from 22,776 to 5,980 courses. Whilst the complete course list was being compiled, course descriptions were added in manually wherever they were missing or incomplete (e.g. in cases where it was simply stated “Please refer to undergraduate/graduate course calendar description”). 

3. Keyword selection 

The keyword list was compiled by using the same keywords that were used for the last inventory as well as any new words proposed by the STARS 3.0 support document. They are included in the excel file under three separate tabs and the methodology for selecting the keywords is outlined below: 

    Sustainability-inclusive courses were identified using the keyword list of 251 independent entries from the STARS 3.0 support document list (tab “All Keywords” in excel file).  

    Sustainability-focused courses were identified using a narrowed-down list of 42 keywords that imply both social/economic and environmental elements (tab “Focused Keywords” in excel file). 

    SDG courses: Each keyword in the original keyword list was labelled with one or more of the United Nations SDGs using keywords in the description of each SDG on the found on the UN SDG website (https://sdgs.un.org/goals). 

4. Keyword search 

The keyword search was performed on a table that included both course titles and course descriptions. Courses were then manually reviewed to ensure that they included actual sustainability content, as defined in the STARS 3.0 technical manual (see tab “Criteria” in excel spreadsheet). The resulting sustainability course inventory included 583 sustainability inclusive or focussed courses. 

5. Inclusion of courses from Mapping Sustainability in Curriculum Survey 

In August 2023, a survey was conducted and included a question for faculty members to self-identify their courses as being sustainability focused, inclusive or not related to sustainability. The list of courses has been included in the excel file in the tab “Faculty self-identification”. The courses that have been identified as sustainability focused or inclusive should be included in the inventory.