Overall Rating Gold - expired
Overall Score 75.77
Liaison Ezra Small
Submission Date March 2, 2018
Executive Letter Download

STARS v2.1

University of Massachusetts Amherst
AC-2: Learning Outcomes

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 3.47 / 8.00 Craig Nicolson
Director of Sustainability Programs
Environmental Conservation
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Total number of graduates from degree programs (i.e. majors, minors, concentrations, certificates, and other academic designations):
6,145

Number of students that graduate from programs that have adopted at least one sustainability learning outcome:
2,666

Percentage of students who graduate from programs that have adopted at least one sustainability learning outcome:
43.38

Do the figures reported above cover one, two, or three academic years?:
One

Does the institution specify sustainability learning outcomes at the institution level (e.g. covering all students)?:
No

Does the institution specify sustainability learning outcomes at the division level (e.g. covering particular schools or colleges within the institution)?:
No

A list or brief description of the institution level or division level sustainability learning outcomes:

At a division level, our School of Earth and Sustainability (SES) does include multiple academic programs with specified sustainability learning outcomes (e.g. the B.S. in Environmental Science, or the B.S. in Sustainable Food and Farming, or the B.S. in Sustainable Community Development). Similarly, at a divisional level the Isenberg School of Management (ISOM) includes courses that are required for students in all six of their undergraduate programs and that have specified sustainability learning outcomes.
However, since neither of these sustainability learning outcome are explicitly specified at the DIVISIONAL level, we count the graduates from relevant programs below under Program Level Learning Outcomes and Course Level Learning Outcomes below.


Does the institution specify sustainability learning outcomes at the program level (i.e. majors, minors, concentrations, degrees, diplomas, certificates, and other academic designations)?:
Yes

A list or brief description of the program level sustainability learning outcomes (or a list of sustainability-focused programs):

Some of our Sustainability-Focused programs include:

AS Arboriculture
BS Environmental Conservation
BS Environmental Science
BA Geography + Earth Sciences
AS Sustainable Food and Farming

BA Resource Economics
BA Landscape Arch and Regional Planning

An example of a program with very clear and explicitly stated sustainability learning outcomes is our Building Construction Technologies B.S. degree, which has the following stated program outcomes.

BCT LEARNING OUTCOMES: Students graduating from our program will be able to...
• Evaluate and specify building energy systems and materials with respect to their ecological impact and their contribution to sustainable design.  
•  Understand physical, mechanical and environmental attributes of wood construction.  
•  Apply a breadth of management skills and an understanding of key business aspects of the design, construction and materials supply industries.
•  Contribute responsibly to a sustainable built environment.  

In addition, some programs that we do not consider explicitly to be "Sustainability-Focused", DO include set of specified sustainability learning outcomes.

For example: even though our Biology B.S. degree program has multiple course options related to sustainability, these courses are all electives. Yet the Biology program learning outcomes include the following:

• Appreciation for the impact of biological science on the environment and society.
• Appreciation for the diversity of living things and the diversity of approaches used to study them.
• Appreciation for the interconnectedness of knowledge.


Do course level sustainability learning outcomes contribute to the figure reported above (i.e. in the absence of program, division, or institution level learning outcomes)?:
Yes

A list or brief description of the course level sustainability learning outcomes and the programs for which the courses are required:

The following list of programs each includes a MINIMUM of at least one required sustainability-focused course. See the additional documentation for the particular courses associated with each program, as well as the number of graduates these programs produced in AY2017.

BA Architecture
BA Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies

BS Biology
AS Arboriculture
BS Environmental Conservation
BS Environmental Science
BS Food Science
BA Geography + Earth Sciences
AS Sustainable Food and Farming
BS Stockbridge School of Agriculture
BS Animal Science | Management

BA Economics
BA Resource Economics
BA Landscape Arch and Regional Planning
BA Sociology
BA Social Thought and Political Economy

BS Civil and Environmental Engineering

BBA Hospitality and Tourism Management
BBA Management
BBA Accounting
BBA Finance
BBA Marketing
BBA Operations and Information Management

BS Nutrition


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:

We count all students who received a Bachelors or Associates degree from a program that included required courses which have at least one of the listed sustainability learning outcomes (some of the programs do also have sustainability learning outcomes for the program as a whole, but our approach for computing the numbers in AC-2 above was based on the required course method).

Data are taken from the OIR Dept Profiles | Campus Detail | Degrees Awarded for 2016/17 (most recent year of data available).


We count all students who received a Bachelors or Associates degree from a program that included required courses which have at least one of the listed sustainability learning outcomes (some of the programs do also have sustainability learning outcomes for the program as a whole, but our approach for computing the numbers in AC-2 above was based on the required course method).

Data are taken from the OIR Dept Profiles | Campus Detail | Degrees Awarded for 2016/17 (most recent year of data available).

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.