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SUSTAINABILITY ASSESSMENT IN
HIGHER EDUCATION
INSTITUTIONS
What and how?
Christian Rammel, Luis Velázquez and Clemens Mader
Introduction
Universities play a crucial role in promoting sustainability principles and should contribute to
a paradigm shift towards a more sustainable society. They are essential drivers of education for
sustainable development (ESD) and constitute fundamental vehicles to explore, test, develop
and communicate conditions for transformative change (Disterheft et al. 2013;Leal Filho 2012).
But before universities can really promote and drive sustainable development (SD), their
sustainability activities must extend a still prevailing narrow perception of sustainability, limited
to environmental issues or the simple integration of sustainability topics into existing curricula
(Wals 2014; Leal Filho 2009). In order to incorporate SD into the daily life of universities,
sustainability has to become mainstream and cannot be implemented as a simple ‘add-on’. This
mainstreaming or institutionalising is only achieved, when the idea of SD is accepted and inte-
grated into a universities’ culture and its day-to-day operations (Lozano 2006a). In short, SD
must become an integrative and structural element of all aspects of higher education institu-
tions (HEI) (Tilbury 2011). Without a whole-institution approach that aims at real change and
a holistic integration of SD, university are caught in a crossfire of greenwashing, reductionist
models and the increasing demand to produce knowledge and students simply for an economy
based on unchallenged economic growth.
Even this necessary mainstreaming process is still difficult to identify on a broader scale (Wals
2014), there are the first signs of a paradigm shift and several small milestones of change became
visible during the last decade. Among others, the recent debate of integrating SD into exiting
approaches of quality management at HEI is one of these milestones, which have the potential
to deliver deep change into the very core of higher education (Fadeeva et al. 2014; Mader
2014). On the contrary to the general perception of quality management at HEI as a tool for
ranking systems, compliance or marketing,quality assurance can be a fundamental tool for tran-
sitions, and as such should be seen as crucial for sustainability at our universities. Especially
newer quality assurance approaches such as the quality culture model and its related shift
towards more development-oriented and value-based aspects (Vettori 2012) exhibit promising
linkages to ESD and sustainability at HEI. Herein, the process of mainstreaming SD could be
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nhanced by bridging the quality culture concept with ESD and reframe sustainability princi-
ples as part of a university’s overall quality goals and procedures (Vettori and Rammel 2014).
This strategy would not only help ESD processes at university to become structurally anchored,
it would also provide the institutional quality assurance system with a constructive orientation
beyond the generation of static performance data and evaluation cycles.Besides different prior-
ities and perspectives of linking SD with the quality management system of HEI, all approaches
exhibit one crucial benefit for mainstreaming SD: if they succeed, sustainability would be
embedded in the structural and institutional setting of the university management and devel-
opment. This means, SD is not seen any longer as an additional cost or perceived as one among
many different competing issues, projects and initiatives.
Complimentary to recent developments around quality assurance and ESD, sustainability
assessment in HEI can be seen as another milestone for enhancing the mainstreaming process
of SD. Recently, an increasing body of literature emphasises sustainability assessment as strong
support for implementing sustainability in HEI (Zwickle et al. 2014; Cairo et al. 2013;
Remington-Doucette et al. 2013). For the challenge to incorporate sustainability in the
management and continuous improvement of the university, assessing the performance and
achievements is seen as one essential aspect of ‘sustainable universities’.
Subsequently, there are a growing number of assessment tools for sustainability in HEI,ranging
from environmental driven approaches, assessing sustainability within the curricula to more inte-
grative and holistic approaches (Cairo et al.2013;Remington-Doucette et al.2013;Lozano 2011).
Among them,there are many promising and effective approaches,which provide potentially useful
insights for different audiences and address important challenges of a ‘sustainable university’.
Nevertheless,the majority of existing assessment tools in HEI still apply a narrow focus on partic-
ular aspects of sustainable development and are often locked into the shortfalls of pure economic
numbers or a predominant accentuation on issues of eco-efficiency (Cairo et al. 2013; Lozano
2006b; Shriberg 2002). Therefore, while stressing the need for an integrative and dynamic assess-
ment, we want to address existing conceptual gaps of sustainability assessment at HEI. Hereby,we
aim at clarifying two basic questions:‘what do we want to assess?’and‘how do we assess?’These ques-
tions might seem to be trivial or even superfluous, but we argue, that many universities have
transferred or modified existing sustainability assessment approaches without asking themselves
these questions in relation to the specific demands of sustainable higher education,before.
We start this chapter by addressing the first question of ‘what do we want to assess?’. This ques-
tion is deeply linked with the ongoing debate about how we define sustainability or
sustainability principles at universities. The sustainability approach adopted by a HEI deter-
mines, to a large extent, the process, direction and outcomes of any sustainability assessment.
Following the recent debate on the fundamentals of a ‘sustainable university’, we argue in this
section that sustainability at HEI reflects a transformative learning process rather than a
concrete final state. Consequently, we must look out for guiding principles that help us to assess
the quality of this process. Building on this, we suggest to orientate the assessment process at
core principles of SD and ESD, which are expressed in key documents of the United Nations
and several international treaties on higher education. The section that follows deals with the
question ‘how do we assess?’ SD at HEI. Here, we argue that a principal weakness of many
sustainability assessment models at universities is their clear prioritisation of predefined
performance improvement and the related top-down, expert driven assessment, where the
focus is more on outputs and states than on processes and change. As we deal with context-
dependent educational institutions that must transform themselves to be transformative,
universities are facing an internal dynamics, which is characterised by renewal, testing, errors
and open outcomes. Consequently, sustainability assessment at HEI must focus more on
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upporting this internal learning process rather than aiming at simple measurements of fixed
performance indicators. The next section tries to answer both questions by providing a list of
conceptual corner stones and attributes of assessing sustainability at HEI. The chapter finishes
with some concluding remarks about sustainability assessment at HEI and related conflicts.
What do we want to assess?
Sustainable universities
In general, sustainability assessment in higher education starts from the assumption that if you
cannot measure sustainability, you can neither manage nor improve it. But the principle under-
standing of sustainability or SD,which shall be implemented by a university,determines largely the
process, direction and outcomes of any sustainability assessment. Thus, we must take a closer look
of how sustainability is reflected in the context of HEI.Despite the growing popularity of SD, we
face a great variety of conflicting ideological, conceptual and terminological aspects of this
concept,which is already discussed in the literature on a broad scale (Sneddon et al.2006;Rammel
and van den Bergh 2003; Folke et al. 2002). Even though there are still interpretations of SD, that
neither see the concept’s inherent demand for radical change nor its integrative and procedural
characteristics,a growing body of literature emphasises SD as an open and undetermined process,
driven by improved understanding, integration and co-evolving dynamics on socio-ecological
systems (Rammel et al. 2007). There is also an increasing consensus about the general principles
that underpin the concept of SD such as intra-and intergenerational equity, participation,norma-
tivity and acknowledging natural limits or justice (UNCED 1992; Commission of the European
Communities 2005), which are also reflected within the key characteristics of ESD (UNESCO
2006). The ongoing discourse about SD launched the debate about the concept of a ‘sustainable
university’and the general role of HEI to initiate and enhance sustainable change.To highlight one
among many definitions,Velazquez et al.(2006:812) define a sustainable university as a
higher education institution, as a whole or as a part, that addresses, involves and
promotes, on regional or global level, the minimization of environmental, economics,
societal, and health negative effects in the use of their resources in order to fulfill its
main functions of teaching, research, outreach & partnership, and stewardship among
other as a way to helping society make the transition to sustainable life styles.
Sustainability processes at universities are being initiated by a variety of key players, in differ-
ent institutional settings with different interests and backgrounds. Consequently, there are
varying conceptions of a ‘sustainable university’ (Velazquez et al. 2006).
Nevertheless, most of these conceptions, which apply an integrative focus, emphasise several
key characteristics of our subject of assessment, sustainability at HEI:
• First, sustainability at HEI covers various interlinked dimensions of a university, such as
teaching, research, management or outreach (Velazquez et al. 2005; Cortese 2003).
• Second, there is no final state of sustainability at universities, rather there is an open learn-
ing process towards a more sustainable educational institution (Lozano 2006a).
• Third, sustainability at HEI has also a strong transformative aspect, that encourages the
involvement of individuals in the transition towards a more sustainable society (Disterheft
et al. 2013).
• Fourth, to be transformative, HEI must transform itself (Mader et al. 2013).
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n short, sustainability at HEI reflects a transformative learning process that bridges different
functions and values along with the stewardship for performing those functions and participa-
tion of stakeholders from inside and outside the university. The degree of change driving this
transformational process is enormous, the implications for the daily life of universities radical
(Thomas 2009). Authors such as Lozano (2006a) understand this process as radical innovation
which, while facing many existing barriers, shall be incorporated incrementally and must
develop along the lines of concrete and standardised quality criteria.
SD and ESD principles
According to these characteristics, assessing sustainability at HEI is assessing the quality of an
integrative process where a possible ‘end-state’ or outcome is not known in advance.
Consequently, this shifts the weight from general assessment objectives aiming at particular
preferred outcomes based on fixed performance indicators towards a stronger focus on the
quality of a dynamic change process and its related quality criteria. Notably, we use here the
term criteria and not indicator. A criterion is a standard by which something is judged.
Moreover, a criterion gives operationally and concrete meaning to a guiding principle or
‘something we want to achieve’ without itself being a direct measure of performance. Thus,
criteria can be seen as the intermediate points of an assessment process to which the data
provided by indicators can be integrated and where an interpretable assessment crystallises. In
contrast, an indicator is any variable that is used to infer the status of a particular criterion.
Indicators should provide a single meaningful message and define what information is deliv-
ered to evaluate the criteria (Siemer et al. 2006; Pokorny and Adams 2003). Together, criteria
and indicators represent a form of communication network and are designed to deliver trans-
parent information sets that are required to implement, monitor and assess sustainability
processes (Prabhu et al. 1998). Fundamental to the use of criteria and indicators for sustain-
ability assessment is the rule that no single criterion or indicator reflects, by itself, a complete
measure of sustainability (Lanckner and Nijkamp 2000). It is the interwoven dynamics and rela-
tions between all criteria and indictors that provide us with an integrative picture that reflects
the quality of the process we want to assess.
As stated before, criteria provide operationally and concrete meaning to a principle. In an
assessment process, a principle reflects a common consensus about particular values, key objec-
tives or normative regulations that form the basis of reasoning or action and provides the
justification for the criteria and indicators (Pokorny and Adams 2003). Hence, the task of defin-
ing guiding principle and objectives at the very start of any assessment is critical as a foundation
for designing appropriate criteria and indicators (Kates et al. 2001). If the quality of a sustain-
ability process is assessed, we have to ask how successful core principles of SD have been put
into practice. Hence, for the context of higher education, we must define core principles that
serve as fundamental focal points for ‘sustainable universities’, and act as actual objectives of the
overall assessment. For defining guiding principles for sustainability processes at HEI, we see
two important aspects: First, the need for comparability and benchmarking of sustainability
assessments at HEI calls for the use of standardised principles, which are principles that that are
based on a strong international consensus and widely in use. Second, as HEI comprise a
dichotomy of an integrative institution that reflects a socio-ecological setting as well as an
educational/research dimension we must look for SD as well as ESD principles, both of which
must drive the assessment of sustainability at HEI.
SD core principles that form the conceptual foundation of SD are reflected by a vast body
of literature within sustainability research and are explicitly stated in a number of key
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ocuments of the United Nations or the European Union (UNCED 1992; Commission of the
European Communities 2005). They are widely known, generally accepted and to a varying
extent already underpin many sustainability assessment approaches (Singh et al. 2012). The
concept of SD and its core principles emerged out of the need to tackle complex sustainabil-
ity challenges we are facing at global scale and gave rise to a new field of sustainability science.
Subsequently, ESD and its guiding principles were born to provide a new educational concept
complementary to sustainability science (Wiek et al. 2011) that shall initiate a radical change in
how we see our world accompanied by enhancing our competencies to shape actively a more
sustainable society. During the last decade, the development of ESD key principles described a
shift from education characterised by issues such as the reductionist view of disciplinary knowl-
edge or a deficit view of the learner (testing and competition) towards a transformative view
of pedagogy and participative learning (Sterling 2010).
A number of declarations and treaties highlight ESD principles in the context of higher
education (Lozano et al. 2013, Disterheft et al. 2013). These university-specific landmark docu-
ments deal with the duties related to universities for SD. By analysing their contents, it is
possible to identify their fundamental characteristics. First of all, they are voluntary statements
of commitment that encourage sustainability leaders in HEI to establish a plan of actions to
promote sustainability in the range of operations that are being carried out by them. While
some declarations need to be endorsed either by individuals representing institutions or
academic departments, groups, other statements only ask to follow their principles.
Consistently, these documents translate a series of general ESD principles (such as listed in
Table 22.1) into the dimensions of HEI: research, education, management and outreach
(Cortese 2003).
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Table 22.1 Key characteristics of ESD named in the International Implementation Scheme
Education for sustainable development will aim to demonstrate the following features:
Interdisciplinary and holistic: learning for sustainable development embedded in the whole curriculum, not
as a separate subject;
Values-driven: it is critical that the assumed norms – the shared values and principles underpinning
sustainable development – are made explicit so that they can be examined, debated, tested and applied;
Critical thinking and problem solving: leading to confidence in addressing the dilemmas and challenges of
sustainable development;
Multi-method: word, art, drama, debate, experience, … different pedagogies which model the processes.
Teaching that is geared simply to passing on knowledge should be recast into an approach in which
teachers and learners work together to acquire knowledge and play a role in shaping the environment
of their educational institutions;
Participatory decision-making: learners participate in decisions on how they are to learn;
Applicability: the learning experiences offered are integrated in day to day personal and professional life;
Locally relevant: addressing local as well as global issues, and using the language(s) which learners most
commonly use. Concepts of sustainable development must be carefully expressed in other languages –
languages and cultures say things differently, and each language has creative ways of expressing new
concepts.
Source: UNESCO 2006
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mong the most recent of these treaties is the ‘Rio+20 Treaty on Higher Education’. It was
developed by more than 30 higher education networks and institutions gathered under the
leadership of the COPERNICUS Alliance, the International Association of Universities and
the United Nations University – Institute of the Advanced Studies for Sustainability. Stressing
a holistic and transformative perspective to sustainable higher education the treaty promotes
the following eight principles:
1. To be transformative, higher education must transform itself
2. Efforts across the higher education system must be aligned
3. Partnership underpins progress
4. Sustainable development is an institutional and sector-wide learning process
5. Facilitating access to the underprivileged
6. Inter- and transdisciplinary learning and action
7. Redefining the notion of quality higher education
8. Sustainable development as a whole-of-institution commitment. (COPERNICUS
Alliance 2012)
Obviously, there are more HEI relevant ESD principles than stated in the Rio+20 Treaty, but
it would already make a big difference to incorporate these principles into ongoing sustain-
ability assessment procedures and shift the focus from economic numbers and environmental
parameters toward more holistic and process-oriented assessment approaches. The key issue
here is the processual and transformative understanding of a ‘sustainable university’ and the
related focus on assessing the quality of this process by using international agreed core princi-
ples of SD and ESD.
Putting the compliance with ESD and SD principles at the forefront of sustainability assess-
ment at HEI, is a possible answer to our first question ‘what do we want to assess?’. We argue
that it is also a first major step towards incorporating assessment models into a sustainability-
orientated governance model of universities. The second step goes along the line of answering
the second question and is about choosing an appropriate assessment framework that can tackle
sustainability at HEI as a transformative learning process.
How do we assess?
Sustainable assessment approaches
After we have defined sustainability at universities as an open and transformative process,whose
quality should be assessed by using core principles of SD and ESD, we have to focus on the
appropriate sustainability assessment framework for HEI. We start this by proving a short
overview about recent trends of sustainability assessment outside and inside of HEI. Over the
last decade, sustainability assessment has received an enormous amount of attention among the
academic community (Morrison-Saunders et al. 2014; Ness et al. 2007; Pope et al. 2004).
Introducing the notion of sustainability science, Kates et al. (2001: 642) identify two crucial
questions which implicitly describe the common ground for sustainability assessment:
How can today’s operational systems for monitoring and reporting on environmen-
tal and social conditions be integrated or extended to provide more useful guidance
for efforts to navigate a transition towards sustainability?
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ow can today’s relatively independent activities of research planning, monitoring,
assessment, and decision support be better integrated into systems for adaptive
management and societal learning?
Beside methodical differences and varying priorities, most of the sustainability assessment tools
in use share the common understanding that for a necessary transition towards a more sustain-
able society, particular objectives and achievements must be assessed. All the existing assessment
models try to tackle the need of individuals, institutions and societies to find metrics, models
and tools for analysing and communicating the unsustainability in current activities and
processes (Bebbington et al. 2007). An issue – especially one as complex as SD – that cannot
be measured will be difficult to improve. Subsequently, assessment tools were developed and
applied for a wide range of contexts and provide us with data, case study experiences, assess-
ment guidelines and most of all concrete suggestions for decision makers (Ness et al. 2007).
Regarding the evolving diversity of sustainability assessment, we define the purpose of
sustainability assessment along the lines of Ness et al. (2007: 499) ‘to provide decision makers
with an evaluation of global to local integrated nature-society systems in short and long term
perspectives in order to assist them to determine which actions should or should not be taken
in an attempt to make society more sustainable’.
Besides the common understanding of the purpose of sustainability assessment, there is no
common consensus about how to categorise tools for sustainability assessment. Existing
overviews of assessment tools have shown that they can be categorised based on factors such as
temporal characteristics (ex-post or descriptive vs. ex-ante or change-oriented and long term
vs. short term), the focus/objectives, or the level of integration (Kates et al. 2001; Finnveden
and Morberg 2005). Ness et al. (2007) divide sustainability assessment tools into three general
categorisation areas:
• Indicator and indices: Indicators are seen as simple measures, mostly quantitative and present
a particular state of economic, social and/or environmental development in a defined
region or context. An index consists of aggregated indicators. In applying a retrospective
point of view indicators and indices are continuously measuring and monitoring in order
to allow timely identification of longer sustainability trends.
• Product related assessment tools: Related to regional flow indicators, these tools focus on flows
in relation with consumption and production of goods and services. Product related assess-
ment tools are mainly focusing on environmental aspects and do not apply an integrative
perspective on socio-ecological dynamics; and
• Integrated assessment tools: Integrated assessment tools aim at supporting decisions related to
a project, management or policy in a defined region or context. They are often based on
system analysis approaches and use scenario methods.These tools all apply an ex-ante focus.
In their comparison of these three categories Ness et al. (2007) emphasise that only integrated
assessment tools are capable to tackle the multi-dimensionality of integrating socio-ecological
facets. In contrast, indicator/indices and product related assessment approaches have a too
narrow focus on environmental parameters as well as expressing a strong retrospective perspec-
tive for analysing the past and are not optimally designed for assessing long-term sustainability
processes.
Other authors such as Morrison-Saunders et al. (2014) are drawing on the original model
of Pope et al. (2004) and distinguish between three different conceptual models of integrative
sustainability assessment:
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Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)-driven integrated assessment: The tools within
this category aim at minimising negative environmental, social and economic (ESE)
impact within acceptable limits;
• Objective-led integrated assessment: This approach is focusing on maximised positive ESE
outcomes; and
• Contribution for sustainability: Tools applying this approach are aimed at delivering posi-
tive outcomes (such as the objective-led integrated assessment model), but do not apply a
separate ESE or triple bottom line perspective and assess whether a proposal makes a suffi-
cient contribution for sustainability.
Arguing for a holistic approach to sustainability assessment, which is outlined by authors such
as Gibson et al. (2005), Morrison-Saunders et al. (2014) criticise the first two approaches for
their simplistic and reductionist ‘triple bottom line’ model. In their description of the contri-
bution for sustainability assessment approach, the authors underline three core aspects of a
holistic sustainability assessment, which are also highly significant for any sustainability assess-
ment approach at HEI:
First, the notion of trade-offs, which means the evaluation and management of trade-offs,
which will inevitable emerge out of the assessment (Morrison-Saunders and Pope 2013). As a
quality defining key feature of an assessment process, the evaluation and tackling of trade-offs
cannot achieved by an objective analysis, but will require a critical and participative judgment
by the involved stakeholders. The consideration of trade-offs is stressing the context specific
character of an integrated sustainability assessment as well as the need for transparent values,
participative learning and decision making. The second notion is interdisciplinarity, which is
already described as a core principle of good impact assessment practice almost 50 years ago
(Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America 1969). Morrison-
Saunders et al. (2014) state that compared to other already applied assessment approaches, only
the contribution for sustainability approach implies the need for interdisciplinarity as the orien-
tation of the assessment towards sustainability principles embodies a multi-dimensional range
of inter-related issues. The third notion highlighted by the authors is the focus on a participa-
tory ex-ante assessment process. Similar to Ness et al. (2007), they argue that due to the
intergenerational mandate and the changing dynamics of expectations and impacts, any top-
down, expert driven ex-post assessment and its related assumptions of unchanging conditions
and maximised outcomes are invalid from an integrative sustainability perspective.
The obvious demand for holistic and integrated assessment, and the necessity to tackle
trade-offs, interdisciplinarity or a participatory ex-ante assessment process already prepare the
conceptual ground for transferring the idea of sustainability assessment into the context of
HEI. Consequently, universities should only consider assessment models that are able to tackle
the dynamic, integrative and open characteristics of SD, which limits the range of potential
candidates to integrative assessment models such as the contribution for sustainability assess-
ment approach.
Sustainability assessment at HEI
A growing number of sustainability assessment tools are trying to embrace the specific context
of sustainable higher education (Cairo et al. 2013; Glover et al. 2011, Lozano 2011; Shriberg
2002). Tools such as AISHE,AUA, STAR, STAUNCH or GASU are among the most promi-
nent and successful assessment pioneers and have been specifically developed and applied at
various universities around the globe (Urbanski and Rowland 2014; Lambrechts and
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eulemans 2013; AUA 2011; Glover et al. 2011; Lozano 2006b; Roorda 2004). Herein, the
usefulness of assessment tools can vary, depending on a number of factors such as size and
complexity of the HEI as well as the scope of its sustainability initiatives to be assessed. Among
the great variety of existing tools, we have chosen the following three sustainability assessment
tools to provide a brief glance at the different ways to assess a ‘sustainable university’.For a more
comprehensive work on the existing tools see Cairo et al. (2013).
A good example for an assessment tool that could provide an initial starting point for an
internal learning process towards a ‘sustainable university’ is the Assessment Instrument for
Sustainability in Higher Education (AISHE). AISHE was one of the first assessment tools for
sustainability at HEI and was developed by the Dutch Committee on Sustainable Higher
Education (CDHO) in 2000–01. After the tool was tested and applied by universities mainly
in Europe, a second version of the tool – AISHE 2.0 was developed in 2009 by a consortium
of researchers from the Netherlands,Austria, Sweden and Spain. The conceptual framework of
AISHE consists of five modules – covering the five functions of universities – and six related
criteria to each module. The criteria are described by five development stages (activity-
oriented, process-oriented, system-oriented, chain-oriented, society-oriented), which should
reflect the process of mainstreaming sustainability. According to those development stages, the
institution is assessing its state of development and developing strategies on how to achieve
higher stages (Roorda et al. 2009). Notably, the self-assessment part of AISHE 2.0 shows that
the success of any sustainability assessment at a university depends strongly on involving stake-
holders from all the different areas or dimensions of a university. However, besides AISHE 2.0
strong accentuation on qualitative and processual aspects, its application at two Austrian univer-
sities in 2014 (one of the authors was involved in both assessment processes) also showed the
need for assessment tools that can be adapted and modified to the particular context and put a
stronger focus on the interactions between the particular criteria and the actual criteria devel-
opment.
A different approach of linking sustainability assessment with internal learning is applied by
the Alternative University Appraisal (AUA). AUA was launched in 2009 as an initiative by the
members of ProSPER.Net (Promotion of Sustainability in Postgraduate Education and
Research Network). This is an Asia-Pacific network coordinated by the United Nations
University – Institute for the Advanced Studies of Sustainability (UNU-IAS) focusing on the
integration of Education for Sustainable Development principles among academic institutions.
AUA was introduced in 2009 as a learning initiative to introduce ESD or advance current ESD
initiatives among ProSPER.Net members, as well as to create a community of learning in
which HEIs can identify their own strengths and weaknesses, learn from one another and share
good practices in their own area of interest (AUA 2011). The AUA model is based upon three
main pillars: education, research and governance.Outreach and transformation are seen as over-
arching criteria that need to be reflected in each of the three main pillars. AUA is providing a
ready questionnaire catalogue that is used for self-reflection or peer reflection. Alongside this
reflection and peer consultation AUA aims at supporting a learning process among participat-
ing institutions. This shall support institutions in their progress of integrating sustainability into
their education, research and governance activities. Furthermore, the questions are taking stock
on initiatives that have already been taken (such as mission planning, educational programs or
research projects and groups) and provide this information to ProSPER.Net members through
community exchange opportunities
Out of the need to track sustainability performance in higher education, the Sustainability
Tracking, Assessment and Rating System (STARS) was developed by the Association for the
Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education based in the US. STARS is a transparent,
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elf-reporting framework that provides colleges and universities with a platform for measuring
their sustainability performance. The system covers areas of higher education including curric-
ula and research, student and public engagement, campus operations as well as investment and
administration (Urbanski and Rowland 2014). After a development phase, the system was offi-
cially launched in 2009. By 2014 more than 300 institutions across the US and Canada have
participated and applied the STARS system, and as international demand has grown, STARS
pilots were also developed for higher education institutions outside US and Canada. STARS is
built upon an online reporting tool. Participating institutions upload their evaluation materials
and receive a rating ranging from Bronze to Platinum, depending on their performance and
points they get. Through the online reporting, actors can also get access to the online infor-
mation system and receive feedback or further information from the growing community of
applicants (Urbanski and Rowland 2014). Clearly STARS is a learning tool that facilitates
capacity building through the self and peer-assessment process.
In spite of these promising developments, many existing sustainability assessment tools,
which are applied in HEI are still locked into the shortfalls of pure economic numbers or into
a predominant accentuation on issues of eco-efficiency (Wals 2014; Shriberg 2002). The reason
for this undesired situation can often be found in the existing orientation towards an entre-
preneurial model of universities (Yarime et al. 2012), which serve as knowledge factories for
economic growth and often follow traditional old mechanistic mental frames of education
(Lozano et al. 2013). Therefore, we argue that without switching from the business-as-usual
approach to the imperative of substantial change, a simple transfer of existing sustainability
assessment models into the context of higher education could easily face dead ends. We also
have already shown, that among the great variety of existing sustainability assessment models,
only a few express an integrative and participative assessment approach that can tackle the
dynamics of a multi-dimensional sustainability process over time. Moreover, all the holistic
assessment tools were developed for corporations, regions or countries and neither include a
focus on ESD nor do they encompass the different functions of HEI (Lozano 2006a). Thus,
HEI have two options: either to develop their own sustainability assessment tools or to modify
already existing ones. Whichever option is chosen, the applied assessment tool must be
designed according to the specific context of a ‘sustainable university’ and ESD. Obviously, we
have to raise the subsequent question: what is this specific context, and what does it mean for
the conceptual cornerstones of sustainability assessment?
As already described before, universities are multi-dimensional institutions that reflect a
socio-ecological setting as well as an educational and research dimension. The socio-ecologi-
cal aspects of HEI are not substantially different from the socio-ecological aspects of other
institutions or organisations, and do not constitute the uniqueness of universities. Nevertheless,
they present an important part of the overall sustainability process at HEI and should be tack-
led through an integrative and participative assessment process and be guided by SD principles.
When it comes to the educational and research dimension, the situation is different. Compared
to other institutions, these two functions of HEI are unique and do not fit into regular sustain-
ability assessment models. Nevertheless, both functions are also essential elements of the overall
sustainability process at HEI and can be assessed similar to socio-ecological elements by using
ESD principles. In the process of developing or modifying a new sustainability assessment tool
for a university, we would start from both sets of principles. The next conceptual steps would
be the development/modification of related sets of criteria, which would provide operationally
and concrete meaning to the principles. Subsequently, appropriate indicators need to be
designed to measure the status of the particular criterion.
However, we have already emphasised that in the very heart of sustainability assessment at
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EI, there is assessing the quality of an integrative process where a possible ‘end-state’ or
outcome is not known in advance. We have defined this process as institutionalised transforma-
tive learning. This is of major importance for the conceptual framework of developing or
modifying appropriated assessment tools. The importance of transformative learning for ESD
has been stated elsewhere by authors such as Sterling (2010) or Thomas (2009). In the context
of a ‘sustainable university’, transformative learning addresses the need of change at two differ-
ent levels. First, it has a strong pedagogic perspective on teaching and emphasises that ‘teaching
approaches must focus on elements relating to the process of learning, rather than the accumu-
lation of knowledge … which provides students with the opportunities to learn to think,
specifically“how to think”rather than“what to think”’(Thomas 2009:245). Along similar lines,
Sterling (2010: 19) defines transformative learning as follows:‘It refers essentially to a qualitative
shift in perception and meaning making on the part of the learner in a particular learning expe-
rience such as the learner questions or reframes his/her assumptions or habits of thought.’
The second level is the level of the overall institutions and reflects learning, innovation and
improvement across the whole institution, which provides the dynamic setting for main-
streaming SD at a university. To overcome existing barriers and prejudices, the
institutionalisation of SD and the related paradigmatic shift across all functions of a HEI need
to be implemented in a participative and incremental way (Lozano 2006b). Transformative
learning at this level is an opportunity to change radically but to achieve it in a sensible and
step-by-step process. As an institutional learning process, it has the power to overcome old
paradigms, internalise new values, skills and behaviour and brings the change from individual
mindsets towards integration towards successful institutionalisation. Without this paradigm
shift, learning at university level would be limited to cosmetic change and efficiency gains. It
would be concerned primarily with doing things (even if unsustainable) better, but not with
doing better things, which would be improvement but no transformation. As stressed by
Sterling (2010: 23):‘The case for transformative learning is that learning within paradigm does
not change the paradigm, whereas learning that facilitates a fundamental recognition of para-
digm and enables paradigmatic reconstruction is by definition transformative’.
Consequently, sustainability assessment at HEI must establish the institutional setting to initi-
ate, monitor and assess the quality of this internal transformative learning process. Cleary, this
excludes any assessment tools based on top-down, expert-driven approaches and stresses the
importance of context-dependent self-assessment as a learning instrument. An appropriate
sustainability assessment tool for HEI provides a sound balance between standardised elements
that aim at comparable outcomes and flexible structures that give enough room to all members
of the university to learn,communicate and collect together the mosaic patterns of their‘sustain-
able university’. Clearly, it is useful to apply already existing and standardised quantitative
indicators when it comes to environmental management aspects. We also argue for using the
four dimensions of a university as reference points of the process, as well as existing ESD and
SD principles as focal points of the assessment process. Besides such standardised specifications,
context-dependency and heterogeneity within and between universities underline the need for
universities to also design their own specific criteria and indicator settings. Although, this
requires more effort, this part of a self-assessment depends on the understanding of the sustain-
ability process itself in order to reach the acceptation of various interest groups on campus.
Answering the questions
In the beginning of this chapter, we raised the questions of ‘what do we assess?’ and ‘how do
we assess?’. To frame the setting of these two questions, we have highlighted the processual and
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ransformative characteristics of a ‘sustainable university’ and defined it as a transformative
learning process that bridges different functions and values along with the stewardship for
performing those functions, and participation of stakeholders from inside and outside the
university. To answer both questions, we have built on existing work within the literature of
sustainability assessment and cast a glance at existing sustainability assessment approaches at
HEI. At the end of this chapter, we want to sum up the issues we have raised and present a
basic conceptual frame for sustainability assessment tools at universities. Hereby, we are follow-
ing Shriberg’s (2002) approach of attributes of an ‘ideal assessment tool’, and summarise our
answers as conceptual corner stones of assessing sustainability at HEI in Table 22.2.
Table 22.2 reflects our general conceptual view on sustainability assessment at HEI. Our
focus on assessing sustainability as the quality of internal learning processes should provide
university stakeholders with guidance to develop or modify an adequate assessment approach
for their own contextual settings. Nevertheless, we are aware that by putting the quality of the
assessment process in the centre of the debate,we risk excluding or marginalising the outcomes
of the sustainability (assessment) processes themselves. Usually, sustainability pioneers at HEI do
not convince decision-makers to implement sustainability assessment through normative or
conceptual arguments. Clearly, without communicating concrete benefits or cost-savings, many
sustainability processes at our universities would not have ever started (Vogtländer et al. 2002).
To name only a few, benefits such as increased resource-efficiency, decreased CO
2
emissions, a
greater transparency of internal decision-making, improved communication patterns, enhanced
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Table 22.2 Key attributes of sustainability assessment at HEI
Sustainability assessment at HEI should reflect the following attributes:
Measures the quality of a sustainability process and not particular states: Sustainability at HEI reflects a
transformative learning process that bridges different functions and values along with the stewardship
for performing those functions and participation of stakeholders from inside and outside the university.
Thus, assessing sustainability at HEI is assessing the quality of this process.
Applies a holistic and integrative perspective: Only a holistic and integrative assessment approach can tackle
the multi-dimensionality of the different functions of HEI and their socio-ecological setting.
Reflects the compliance with SD and ESD principles: SD and ESD principles shall serve as concrete focal
points for the assessment process. Evaluating their actual compliance is at the forefront of the
assessment.
Initiates an institutional learning process towards a more sustainable university: The main objective of the
assessment process is initiating an institutional learning process that reflects a sustainable transformation.
Is participative: The assessment must have a strong participatory aspect reflected in the learning process as
well as in the related decision making (e.g. the management and weighting of related trade-offs).
Is interdisciplinary: Interdisciplinarity must be an integrative aspect of the assessment process, as the
orientation of the assessment towards sustainability principles embodies a multi-dimensional range of
inter-related issues.
Is comparable:The assessment must integrate processes and outcomes into a comparable, understandable
and calculable framework to support benchmarking and the identification of good practice.
Emphasises transparency and comprehensibility. Sustainability assessment tools must be transparent and
comprehensible to stakeholder inside and outside of HEI.
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ooperation with sustainability-oriented business, and many other aspects could be highlighted
and explained in more detail as outcomes of sustainability (assessment) processes at universities
(Maiorano and Savan, 2015).
The reason why we did not put much accentuation on concrete sustainability outcomes is
that outcomes such as increased eco-efficiency or bigger cost-savings are already reflected by
most existing assessment approaches. Transformative learning or a holistic and participative
assessment, however, is reflected in only a few existing approaches. To change or extend an
already existing assessment tool, which is mostly limited to a predominant accentuation on a
few concrete outcomes like eco-efficiency, is a real challenge. By contrast, we think that start-
ing from an integrative conceptual framework should provide the base for an assessment process
that can tackle both: the requirements of ESD and SD principles, as well as the subsequent need
for concrete benefits as outcomes of the sustainability (assessment) process. When applying a
participative self-assessment process, which is driven by continuous internal learning and
improvement, concrete benefits like cost savings or resource-efficiency will follow. We even
argue that participation and the ability to link with internal learning processes – both major
aspects for increasing the quality of a sustainability assessment at HEI – do not only provide a
much more comprehensive picture of the actual sustainability process at a university. Bringing
together different stakeholders with different backgrounds and ideas from all university areas
has the potential to assess the status quo more accurately than integrating only the perspectives
of a few ‘experts’. The integration of various university stakeholders in the assessment process
provides more creative and more efficient sustainability measures, as the process itself can draw
on many insights from a range of university areas, disciplines and professional backgrounds.
Subsequently, the actual measures, strategies or initiatives that emerge out of the assessment
process are supported by a greater number of stakeholders across the particular institutional
levels.
Conclusions
As old mental models and reductionist perceptions of SD prevail, sustainability assessment at
HEI is still more concerned with economic numbers or fixed performance indicators based on
efficiency gains and international rankings. Therefore, it is of uttermost importance to apply
integrative and participative assessment models that enhance the mainstreaming of a ‘sustain-
able university’ through initiating an institutionalised and transformative learning process. The
degree of change driving this process is enormous, the implications for the culture of univer-
sities radical and obviously there will be conflicts and resistance. As mainstreaming sustainability
is opposing the current neo-liberal setting at many HEI, these conflicts are necessary and must
be dealt with in a transparent and sensible way during an assessment. Integrative and participa-
tive assessment tools provide an institutional learning process that is shaped by an open dialogue
of the various stakeholder groups. This dialogue about values, interpretations of SD or about
the fundamental purpose of education itself offers a promising setting to tackle these conflicts
in a way that sustainability as radical innovation is implemented incrementally and guided by
social learning, participation and empowerment. A continuous accentuation of sustainability
assessment tools on operational eco-efficiency does not support sustainable change at HEI. On
the contrary, this creates the impression that we need no change at HEI at all, as sustainability
would be only a matter of technological control and can be tackled sufficiently by the already
existing structures and patterns of our universities. At the end of the day, HEI will only be able
to drive sustainable development and contribute to a paradigm shift towards a more sustainable
society if they succeed in overcoming their own internal inertia and transform themselves.
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