| Overall Rating | Silver - expired |
|---|---|
| Overall Score | 58.51 |
| Liaison | Aimee Lemrise |
| Submission Date | Nov. 23, 2016 |
| Executive Letter | Download |
Southern Illinois University Carbondale
AC-1: Academic Courses
| Status | Score | Responsible Party |
|---|---|---|
|
12.58 / 14.00 |
Derick
Chick Graduate Asssistant Sustainability Office |
Figures required to calculate the percentage of courses with sustainability content::
| Undergraduate | Graduate | |
| Total number of courses offered by the institution | 1,072 | 673 |
| Number of sustainability courses offered | 167 | 49 |
| Number of courses offered that include sustainability | 240 | 92 |
Number of academic departments (or the equivalent) that offer at least one sustainability course and/or course that includes sustainability (at any level):
Total number of academic departments (or the equivalent) that offer courses (at any level):
Number of years covered by the data:
A copy of the institution’s inventory of its course offerings with sustainability content (and course descriptions):
An inventory of the institution's course offerings with sustainability content (and course descriptions):
The website URL where the inventory of course offerings with sustainability content is publicly available:
A brief description of the methodology the institution followed to complete the course inventory:
The following steps were taken to identify a list of "Sustainability Courses" and "Courses That Include Sustainability:"
1. A graduate student reviewed processes used by other universities and reported them to the Sustainability Coordinator. The following process was agreed upon by the Sustainability Council as the most appropriate for our university at this time and was followed.
2. A graduate student identified and created a list of sustainability keywords. These keywords were reviewed by the Sustainability Council. The Council made suggested changes to the list and the finalized list was voted on and approved by the Council. This keyword list is at the bottom of this section.
3. A graduate student searched the course directory catalog for the 2015-16 school year using the keyword list above to identify a list of sustainability courses.
4. The graduate student reviewed the course descriptions and completed an initial coding process for each course to identify it as a "Sustainability Course" (coded as "F" ) or a "Course That Includes Sustainability" (coded as "R").
5. A team of 4 individuals (the 3 faculty members from the Sustainability Council and the Sustainability Coordinator) met to review the list created by the graduate student. (This list included the Department, Course Number, Course Title, Level, and Catalog Description.) The team of 4 reviewed the STARS definitions V 2.0 for "Sustainability Courses" and "Courses That Include Sustainability." The team discussed the definitions and, as a team, coded some courses together.
6. The entire course list was divided into 4 groups. Each of the 4 members of this small team was responsible for reviewing a list of 150-200 courses. Even with the definitions offered by STARS, it was not always clear what category the course should fall into. As such, the team used evidence in the course description and any personal knowledge of the course to determine if it should be a "Sustainability Course,” a "Course That Includes Sustainability," or if it should be removed from the list. If the majority of words included in the course description were sustainability terms, the course was coded as a "Sustainability Course." If the keywords identified courses that could not be coded as a "Sustainability Course" or a "Course That Includes Sustainability," they were deleted from the list.
The attached course list uses the coding of "F" and "R," which we recognize references the STARS early version of coding for this credit. Please note, however, that the Version 2 credit criteria was applied during the course identification process.
Sustainability Keywords
Agriculture
Alternative
Awareness
Balance
Behavior Change
Biodiversity
Bioenergy
Biomass
Carbon (to detect Carbon offset)
Change
Climate
Communit (to detect “community”, “communities”)
Conservation
Conserve
Collaboration
Culture
Social responsibility (to detect “social responsibility”, “social responsibilities”)
Democra (to detect “democracy”, “democratic”)
Diversity
Drought
Development
Design
Deforestation
Economy
Ecolog (to detect “ecology”, “ecological”)
Ecosystem
Eco-system
Energ (to detect “energy”, “energies”)
Environment (to detect “environment”, “environmental”, “environmentally”)
Engage
Entrepreneurship
Equality
Equit (to detect “equity”, “equitable”)
Farming
Finance
Flood
Food ( to detect foodchain, food systems, foot prints)
Future
Gender
Geothermal
Global
Governance
Green
Growth
Human (to detect Human conditions, Rights, Environment)
Innovat (to detect innovation, innovative)
Indigen (to detect “indigenous”, “indigene”)
Intergenerational
Inter-generational
Invest
Justice
Land
Landscape
LEED
Life
Local
Marine
Minority
Modernization
Movements
Multidisciplinary
Natural Systems
Nature
Nutrition
Outreach
Planning
Policy
Poverty
Public
Prosperity
Pollut (to detect “pollution”, “polluting”)
Resilien (to detect “resilience”, “resiliency”, “resilient”)
Resource
Race
Recycle
Renewable
Resilience
Rights
Rural
Scarce
Scarcity
Sustainab (to detect “sustainable”, “sustainability”)
Solutions
Stakeholder
Social
Stewardship
System thinking
Systems thinking
Triple bottom line
Technology
Transdisciplinary
Transformation
Transit
Transparency
Undeserved
Urban agriculture
Urbanization
Waste
Water
Welfare
Wealth
Wildlife
Wind
Women
How did the institution count courses with multiple offerings or sections in the inventory?:
A brief description of how courses with multiple offerings or sections were counted (if different from the options outlined above):
Which of the following course types were included in the inventory?:
| Yes or No | |
| Internships | Yes |
| Practicums | Yes |
| Independent study | Yes |
| Special topics | No |
| Thesis/dissertation | Yes |
| Clinical | No |
| Physical education | Yes |
| Performance arts | Yes |
Does the institution designate sustainability courses in its catalog of course offerings?:
Does the institution designate sustainability courses on student transcripts?:
Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
The attached course list uses the coding of "F" and "R," which we recognize references the STARS early version of coding for this credit. Please note, however, that the Version 2 credit criteria was applied during the course identification process.
The attached course list uses the coding of "F" and "R," which we recognize references the STARS early version of coding for this credit. Please note, however, that the Version 2 credit criteria was applied during the course identification process.
The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.