Modelling the enablers of sustainability in higher education institutions

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore and encapsulate the enablers that can facilitate education for sustainable development in higher education (HE). The study also aims to understand the interdependence between the enablers. Design/methodology/approach The study adopts the total interpretive structural modelling approach to comprehend the interaction and transitivity between the enablers. Cross-impact multiplication matrix analysis was applied to rank the enablers and classify them on the basis of the driving and dependence power into dependent, autonomous, independent and linkage enablers. Findings An extensive literature review and expert opinion helped in identifying 10 enablers that can promote sustainability in higher education. The structural model revealed government policies, media, accreditation/sustainability audit, sustainability leadership and institutional commitment as the crucial enablers that can drive sustainability and activate the enablers with high dependence and low driving power. Practical implications The results of this study will assist the policymakers and management of universities and colleges in understanding important factors that can facilitate sustainability in higher education. Universities and colleges to incorporate sustainability in their system need to transform not only the core higher education activities of learning and teaching, research and engagement, also the way the colleges operate its culture, governance, structure and how it supports the staff and students. Originality/value So far, research on sustainability in higher education has looked into each factor in isolation. This research provides a comprehensive view of the factors and has attempted to establish a multidirectional interplay between factors facilitating sustainability in higher education (SHE).

A study on the influential factors of the last mile delivery projects during Covid-19 era

“…On the basis of the sample statistics and t-values, the results of hypotheses testing are shown in Table 7 . At a 5 percent significance level, all those links that had a value less than 0.025 (significance value for a one-tailed test) were accepted, and other links were rejected (Menon and Suresh 2021c ). Out of 22 links, the majority of the links were accepted and only four transitive links got rejected.…”

How sustainable is the governance for sustainability in higher education? Insights from an Italian case study

“…Also, the presence of green offices (or the intention to establish them) was identified as a “visible product” (Schein, 1992, p. 17) of the sustainability culture in each university. Therefore, on the one hand, participants confirmed the importance placed on culture in models for GFS (Menon and Suresh, 2022; Hoover and Harder, 2015), but on the other hand, their perception of culture as a requirement for implementing GFS seems to contradict some viewpoints in the literature. For example, Roos et al (2022) argue that sustainability governance affects sustainability culture, not the other way around.…”

“…Culture . Culture emerges in models for sustainability, particularly in HE (Menon and Suresh, 2022; Hoover and Harder, 2015). To promote sustainability, it is important to understand which values constitute an organization’s culture and what values can align that culture with sustainability (Marques et al , 2021).…”

Enablers facilitating industry-academia, transnational education and university-community partnering agility in higher education

“…Yet another partnership that has gained momentum in the recent past is the collaboration between colleges and the neighbouring communities (Holland et al, 2003). Higher education institutions, through service-learning, research projects and training programmes, have been working towards improving the living conditions of people in these communities by responding to their needs and challenges (Martin et al, 2005;Wedekind and Mutereko, 2016;Waas et al, 2010;Menon and Suresh, 2021). Although there have been studies in the past that have focused on the success factors (Rybnicek and K€ onigsgruber, 2019;Ankrah and Omar, 2015) that can facilitate industryacademia interface, none of the studies have combined enablers of different types of academic partnerships in higher education.…”