Dickinson College
AC-9: Research and Scholarship

Inventory from February 2017 is attached above.

The Center for Sustainability Education (CSE) maintains active relationships with faculty across all divisions of the college. CSE staff conducted the 2017 Faculty Research Inventory using the following resources to identify faculty that are engaging in sustainability research. - Individual consultations with faculty (specifically targeting past participants of our Valley & Ridge curriculum development workshops since 2008) - Review of project descriptions and final reports for all faculty funded by the Sustainability Education Fund (for projects and research that advances sustainability-related scholarship and creativity) - Review of project titles and descriptions for faculty funded by the College's Research and Development Committee for the last three years (college-wide funding office for all travel, research, and project funding) - Review of college news related to faculty research An extensive survey of sustainability related faculty scholarship was conducted in 2011 under the direction of the Center for Sustainability Education with support from the Dickinson Provost. Responses were received from 107/217 full time faculty to whom the request was sent for a response rate of 49%. Results of the survey were used to create a baseline for this inventory of sustainability related scholarship at Dickinson that has since been maintained and updated. The 2017 update used this survey as a baseline to apply to tenure faculty that are still actively conducting research at Dickinson. In the 2017 assessment we were able to assess 100% of the full time faculty.

Dickinson supports sustainability research efforts by faculty. We define sustainability for the purposes this analysis as the capacity to meet present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. Scholarship includes all activities identified in Dickinson’s Academic Handbook as relevant to the evaluation of scholarly activity and achievement for faculty promotion and tenure decisions. Sustainability related scholarship is defined as scholarship that advances and enriches understanding of sustainability. It includes inquiries into the nature of sustainability and the conditions, means and challenges for creating sustainable systems, as well as scholarship that is tangential to but can contribute to such inquiries. Dickinson's Center for Sustainability Education works to promote, fund, and track progress of Dickinson's approximately 200 tenure and tenure track faculty that are conducting research to seek connections to sustainability. This inventory demonstrates that this effort has been successful in reaching across the curriculum.