Universities are facing increased pressure to improve their contribution to sustainable development goals! While sustainability-related courses have become more common throughout HEIs across Europe in recent years, with this experience we have recognised that sustainability belongs in every classroom and as an operational responsibility relating to our internal performance on carbon footprints, campus management and how we impact the communities we serve.
We have already lost 20% of the last decade in which to make the SDG’s a cornerstone of European HEI operations, teaching, and policy development.
Therefore, the SDS4HEI Project is extremely necessary.
Europe is embarking on a Green Recovery to restore European prosperity and tackle the urgent and interconnected challenges of social equality, economic development, climate change, and biodiversity loss.
SDS4HEI aims to embed the sustainable development goals as a core component within Higher Education Institutes across Europe, tackling their strategic plans, organisational culture, teaching & onsite practices by encouraging the weaving of sustainability into the fabric of education.
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015, provides a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future. At its heart are the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are an urgent call for action by all countries - developed and developing - in a global partnership. They recognize that ending poverty and other deprivations must go hand-in-hand with strategies that improve health and education, reduce inequality, and spur economic growth – all while tackling climate change and working to preserve our oceans and forests.
