Overall Rating Silver
Overall Score 58.26
Liaison Caitlin McLennan
Submission Date Oct. 10, 2022

STARS v2.2

Utah State University
AC-6: Sustainability Literacy Assessment

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 2.00 / 4.00 Alexi Lamm
Sustainability Coordinator
Facilities
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Does the institution conduct an assessment of the sustainability literacy of its students?:
Yes

Which of the following best describes the literacy assessment? The assessment is administered to::
A subset of students or a sample that may not be representative of the predominant student body

Which of the following best describes the structure of the assessment? The assessment is administered as a::
Pre- and post-assessment to the same cohort or to representative samples in both a pre- and post-test

A copy of the questions included in the sustainability literacy assessment(s):
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A list or sample of the questions included in the sustainability literacy assessment or the website URL where the assessment tool may be found:

In the 2020-2021 academic year, we piloted a sustainability culture and literacy assessment. It included relational values, self-assessed importance of sustainability, sustainability knowledge, self-assessed sustainability knowledge, and demographics. Over 500 students participated.

Klain, S. C., Olmsted, P., Chan, K. M., & Satterfield, T. (2017). Relational values resonate broadly and differently than intrinsic or instrumental values, or the New Ecological Paradigm. PloS one, 12(8), e0183962.

Zwickle, A., & Jones, K. (2018). Sustainability knowledge and attitudes—Assessing latent constructs. In Handbook of sustainability and social science research (pp. 435-451). Springer, Cham.


A brief description of how the literacy assessment was developed and/or when it was adopted:

For example, these are some of the literacy questions:
- What is the most common cause of pollution of streams and rivers?
- Ozone forms a protective layer in the earth’s upper atmosphere. What does ozone protect us from?
- Which of the following is an example of sustainable forest management?


A brief description of how a representative sample was reached (if applicable) and how the assessment(s) were administered :

Faculty volunteered to give pre- and post-assessments in their classes.


A brief summary of results from the literacy assessment(s):

The objective Assessment of Sustainability Knowledge and relational values did not meaningfully change between pre- and post-assessments at the beginning and end of the semester. However, the number of courses a student had taken that included sustainability affected ASK scores.


Website URL where information about the sustainability literacy assessment is available:
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Additional documentation to support the submission:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
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