The literature on integrating sustainability in higher education curricula has identified a series of circumstances that can hinder or slow down the transition towards education for sustainable development. This article assesses the influence of two of these circumstances in Spanish universities: teachers' insufficient support for the principles and objectives of sustainable development and their reluctance to consider conveying values as part of their teaching duties. The article collects evidence from the opinions of instructors obtained via a survey, and it concludes that neither of the two circumstances can explain the slowness with which the principles of education for sustainable development are permeating university curricula.

The reform of higher education institutions is no longer confined to the theoretical domain. This article describes some of the organizational developments that have occurred in Spanish public universities over the past decade. It does so from the perspective of the academics who staff universities, considering their perceptions on the nature and consequences of said reforms, and gathering their views on the influence these have had on their job satisfaction. The responses are analyzed using descriptive statistical methods, including principal components analysis. The article concludes that the model of reform in Spanish higher education is different from the one in English-speaking countries in that the erosion of collegiality is due more to the standardization of the academic role than to the reinforcement of managerial authority. The impact on academics’ job satisfaction is negative.

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This article describes the ramifications that recent organisational changes in the Spanish higher education sector have had on levels of job satisfaction among teaching staff. The research gathered their opinions on recent changes affecting their teaching duties, using job satisfaction scales in different areas of their academic work. The results point to a large number who claim to have seen their job satisfaction diminish over the period in which the organisational changes have taken hold. This sense of loss of job satisfaction is positively and significantly related to growing standardisation and to the erosion of the principles of collegiality, but negatively to the initiatives for improving the coordination between teaching staff and the assessment of the quality of their work.

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This article sets out to investigate the notions Spanish university teaching staff have of quality in education, on the assumption that those notions give a reliable picture of the attitudes of teaching staff towards education policy design and university management. The paper takes an empirical approach, collecting opinions telematically via a questionnaire. The responses show that teaching staff prefer modern notions of quality in teaching, and those closer to the culture of their educational institutions, but are not confident that their managers share those preferences. The opinions of teaching staff can provide useful information for the design of education policies and quality management systems applicable to Spanish universities.