Overall Rating Gold - expired
Overall Score 72.17
Liaison Chris Frantsvog
Submission Date March 1, 2019
Executive Letter Download

STARS v2.1

Luther College
AC-7: Incentives for Developing Courses

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 2.00 / 2.00 Jon Jensen
Professor of Philosophy and Environmental Studies
Philosophy, Environmental Studies
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Does the institution have an ongoing program or programs that offer incentives for faculty in multiple disciplines or departments to develop new sustainability courses and/or incorporate sustainability into existing courses?:
Yes

A brief description of the program(s), including positive outcomes during the previous three years (e.g. descriptions of new courses or course content resulting from the program):

Luther College offers multiple incentives for incorporating sustainability into new and existing courses including the following:

- faculty development workshops focused on sustainability in the curriculum
- financial incentives for faculty who create a new course or modify an existing course to include sustainability (as funding is available)
- a learning community of faculty who provide mutual support and guidance in the process of course development to include sustainability

Luther College has been working to incorporate sustainability in the curriculum in various ways for over 10 years. This started when two Luther faculty members attended an AASHE sustainability across the curriculum workshop in January 2008. That sparked a series of summer workshops and a multi-pronged approach to reaching every department with information about sustainability in the curriculum. In recent years, the Center for Sustainable Communities has partnered with the Dean's Office to develop faculty development programming to continue this work including financial incentives for new course development. This program included a workshop in the summer modeled on AASHE's sustainability across the curriculum workshops. After the summer workshop, faculty involved met monthly for six months to share ideas and resources and provided mutual accountability as they developed their courses. While this program does not run every year, we continue to do workshops on sustainability in the curriculum.

Examples of new courses that include sustainability from the past two years include:
ENVS 250: Sustainability, Systems, and Solutions
PSYCH 245: Environmental and Political Psychology
POLS 340: Environmental Justice and Law
INTS 239: Ethical Engagement in a Changing World
ENVS 134: The Earth System
PAID 450: Nordic Environmentalism
PHIL 185: Nature, Self, and World


A brief description of the incentives that faculty members who participate in the program(s) receive:

Faculty participants received a total of $1200 for successfully completing this program.

Faculty participants in faculty development workshops receive $50-100. Faculty who participate in the 6 month learning community receive up to $1200.


The website URL where information about the programs or initiatives is available:
Additional documentation to support the submission:
Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
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