Georgia Institute of Technology
IN-6: Center for Sustainability Across the Curriculum

Georgia Tech’s formal program to integrate Sustainability Across the Curriculum was launched in 2015 with the creation of the Center for Serve-Learn-Sustain (SLS). Focusing on community-engaged sustainability education that centers the “equity” component of sustainability’s three “Es” (equity, economy, environment), SLS was Georgia Tech’s 2015-2020 Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP) and earned a commendation from the Institute’s accreditation body for its “exceptional execution.” SLS’s Affiliated courses Program, which integrates sustainability into courses across all six colleges at the Institute, also was a winner of AASHE's 2020 Campus Sustainability Achievement Award.

Since its inception, SLS has provided regular opportunities for faculty development and built a Teaching Toolkit that continues to support the work of Georgia Tech instructors to advance sustainability learning across all six colleges. Growing faculty engagement with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) sparked collaboration between the Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) and SLS on faculty development opportunities related to the SDGs. In early 2020, the “Think Globally, Teach Locally” workshop highlighted the work of five faculty members across diverse disciplines. The following year, CTL and SLS extended this collaboration through the RCE Greater Atlanta, a regional sustainability network acknowledged by the United Nations University in 2017 as a Regional Centre of Expertise on Education for Sustainable Development. In early 2021, CTL and SLS led a cross-institutional planning team that included faculty and educational developers from Georgia State and Kennesaw State Universities to present a virtual workshop called “Going Global” that included nearly 50 faculty members from 14 colleges and universities across the U.S., Europe, and South America, all interested in teaching with the SDGs. CTL, SLS, and Kennesaw’s Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL) then partnered to offer a Fall 2021 Faculty Learning Community (FLC) on Teaching with the SDGs and a Spring 2022 Sustainability/SDG Fellows Program.

In addition to the work of SLS and CTL to support faculty interested in engaging with sustainability and the SDGs in their teaching, campus conversations about the SDGs expanded through Georgia Tech’s 2020-21 Institute Strategic Planning (ISP) process. Several portions of the ISP embrace Sustainability Education that equips students to solve global challenges and create a more just and sustainable society. Specifically, ISP objectives that support Education for Sustainable Development (SDG target 4.7) include: “strengthen the curriculum in areas that support the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals” and “make experiential, problem-based service learning a signature of all academic and research programs.” An implementation team called Sustainability Next began meeting in 2021 and has published a detailed plan of action.

The Education for Sustainable Development portion of the Sustainability Next Plan (SNP) included a new position within CTL to support faculty development in Sustainability Education across all six colleges with the aim of expanding sustainability integration across the curriculum: Assistant Director, Faculty Development for Sustainability Education Initiatives. Currently, Sustainability Next and CTL support and expand sustainability across the curriculum through the following initiatives:

Undergraduate Sustainability Education Innovation Awards: In 2023, the SNP awarded 30 course design/redesign grants to faculty totaling roughly $200,000. The grants, up to $10,000 each, support intensive course design or redesign to incorporate sustainability and the SDGs across core courses, mid-level courses, and capstone courses, including first-year courses required of all students in computing and health and wellness. With these course redesign and new course design projects, virtually every student at Georgia Tech will experience courses with significant sustainability and SDG content integrates into disciplinary knowledge and skills.
Faculty Development supporting sustainability across the curriculum: In addition to the programming led by SLS and CTL described above, new Georgia Tech Communities of Practice created in 2023 provide ongoing CTL course design support and peer mentoring for faculty across disciplines. Faculty are supported in community-engagement by SCoRE staff, and in course design and pedagogy by CTL. The Georgia Tech Community of Practice also supports culture change in teaching and learning and outreach to faculty not yet engaged in sustainability course integration.
Undergraduate Sustainability Education Committee: In early 2023 a formal committee with faculty representation from almost every degree program was formed to provide grassroots leadership to further advance sustainability across the curriculum. This group provides a formal conduit to almost every department for advancing course integration of sustainability and the SDGs.
Regional leadership: Georgia Tech also initiated in 2022 and continued to co-lead a Georgia-wide Community of Practice on College Teaching with the SDGs, supporting sustainability across the curriculum at other institutions.

Undergraduate Sustainability Education Innovation Awards:

https://research.gatech.edu/undergraduate-sustainability-education-innovation-grants-will-transform-courses-all-six-colleges

https://ctl.gatech.edu/request-proposals-undergraduate-sustainability-education-innovation-grants


Sustainability Next Plan: https://sustain.gatech.edu/sustainabilitynext-plan/

Cross-institutional Leadership: https://serve-learn-sustain.gatech.edu/serve-learn-sustain-ctl-and-rce-greater-atlanta-partners-lead-initiative-support-curricular