Analysis of sustainability presence in Spanish higher education

Abstract

Purpose: This paper analyzes the presence of sustainability in sixteen Spanish Higher Education curricula in the fields of Education and Engineering. Design/Methodology/Approach: The methodology employs two instruments: the Sustainability Map and the Sustainability Presence Map. These instruments enable the following: to analyze the number of subjects that develop sustainability and the sustainability presence level in each curriculum; to identify at what domain levels of the learning taxonomy sustainability is most developed; and to analyze whether a correlation exists between the sustainability presence and the number of subjects that develop sustainability in each curriculum.

Findings: A wide variety of subjects develop sustainability in a given degree, depending on the university. The presence of sustainability is more homogeneous in education degrees than in engineering degrees. Education degrees have a greater presence of sustainability in the lower domain levels of the taxonomy, while in engineering degrees the lower levels of the taxonomy have a lower presence of sustainability than the higher levels. Finally, a correlation appears to exist between the number of subjects that develop sustainability in the curriculum and the sustainability presence. However, engineering degrees seem to need fewer subjects than education degrees to achieve the same degree of sustainability presence.

Originality/Value: This paper proposes a methodology to measure sustainability presence that can be applicable to the curricula of a Higher Education degree if the corresponding Sustainability Map is available. To our knowledge, this is the largest study yet conducted to analyze the presence of sustainability in different Higher Education curricula.