As we approach the advent of the new academic year, it is time to revisit the values that shape our pedagogy and how educational institutions integrate these values into their curricula. One of the most critical areas where these values influence both teaching and learning is our engagement with the environment. The devastating heatwaves recently witnessed across most of the country, which have now given way to the fury of the monsoon in many States, reiterate that the spectre of climate change is well and truly upon us.
Need for Climate Action:
The US-based National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), which manages one of the world’s largest archives of atmospheric, geophysical, and oceanic data, has been recording a consistent rise in average global temperatures due to increased greenhouse gas emissions. This trend has been leading to more frequent extreme heat episodes, as witnessed in the summer of 2024 in India. Similarly, the World Bank predicts that a 2°C rise in the world’s average temperatures will make India’s monsoons too highly unpredictable and disruptive, leading to more heavy rainfall events in future.
How can we better prepare posterity to deal with this climate crisis? Do we have a clear roadmap, going forward, to navigate the challenges emanating from this phenomenon? More important still, can we train our next generation to arrest or reverse, even marginally, the adverse impact of the looming environmental hazards literally staring us in the face?
How Higher Education Can Foster Environmental Awareness?
Let us address these questions by foregrounding the small steps that could cumulatively have big outcomes in guiding our planet towards a more human-friendly future. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) laid down by the United Nations in 2015 are aimed at identifying ‘call for action’ strategies to tackle various socio-economic and environmental challenges, including climate change. The UN agenda states that higher education institutes can play a crucial role in promoting environmental awareness among their students.
India’s National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 too underlines the importance of integrating environmental education into the academic curricula of schools and colleges for sensitising students towards sustainable development.
In accordance with the imperative to link education with environmental conservation, the Times Higher Education (THE) Impact rankings, founded in 2019, assess Universities across the world on the fulfilment of their mandate towards delivering the SDGs, including SDG 13 on climate change.
Ahmedabad University’s Sustainability Strategy:
Here, let us examine the performance of one of the institutions that has embarked on an ambitious plan to deliver on the SDG on environment, viz., Ahmedabad University, a relatively young institution that takes sustainability very seriously in terms of both theory and action. With the University climbing up from eighth to sixth place among the 105 participating Indian institutions in THE Impact assessments on SDG 13, and ranked 18th among South Asian Universities in 2024, its environmental strategy can be seen as a case study for robust climate action.
Julian Dautremont, Director of Programs for the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE), contends that higher education institutions are uniquely placed to contribute to environmental conservation on three parameters. First, they can make faculty and students effective drivers of sustainability innovation. Second, they can focus their research prowess on developing sustainable solutions such as advancements in renewable energy technology. Third, their campuses can serve as important demonstration sites for the successful implementation of these solutions. Its comprehensive green strategy makes Ahmedabad University a role model on all three AASHE criteria.
On the pedagogical front, the University’s mandatory Foundation programme for incoming students lays strong emphasis on the environment. Further, it offers doctoral, graduate, and undergraduate programmes with key sustainability components, such as PhD in Management (Climate Change/Energy/Environment), BTech in Chemical and Environment Engineering, and other courses imparting learning on the SDGs. The University has also instituted a Global Centre for Environment and Energy for conducting interdisciplinary research on climate change mitigation and adaptation.
A Green Campus Shows the Way:
However, the best example of environmental responsibility on the part of the University is simply its campus. Located in the heart of the bustling city of Ahmedabad in the State of Gujarat, the University precincts are akin to an urban micro-forest. Its sprawling campus is populated with numerous varieties of flora and fauna, including birds, butterflies, amphibians, mammals, and reptiles, and last but not the least, an arboretum comprising more than 1500 trees of 100 different species that functions as a green lung for the University in particular, and for the city as a whole.
In addition, Ahmedabad University’s green initiative includes various other climate mitigation efforts. With an installed solar power capacity of 638 kW, the University has not only contributed towards lowering carbon footprints and greenhouse emissions but has also been able to meet more than 8 per cent of its electricity needs through non-fossil low-energy sources. Further, a stepwell located in the University Centre grounds, which doubles up both as an amphitheatre and a quiet getaway from the busy academic routine for students, functions as a repository of rainwater, allowing it to seep into the ground through several percolation wells.
The other notable measures undertaken by Ahmedabad University encompass organic farming, waste management, and sustainable food production and consumption, all intended to create an ecosystem for strengthening ecology and protecting biodiversity.
The Secretary General of the UN COP26 Climate Summit in 2021 had outlined this grave scenario: “Our fragile planet is hanging by a thread. We are knocking on the door of climate catastrophe.” The Ahmedabad University experience underscores that higher education institutions can become significant agents in combating this threat by making students responsible global citizens and instilling in them a mindset for nurturing a healthy ecological relationship between humanity and nature.
Anupma Mehta is Associate Director, Content and Communications, at Ahmedabad University. Views are personal.
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