Opening up the Pandora's box of sustainability league tables of universities: a Kafkaesque perspective

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to explore the institutional impact of sustainability league tables on current university agendas. It focuses on a narrative critique of one such league table, the

Is students’ energy literacy related to their university’s position in a sustainability ranking?

“…These questions cover several aspects, as responses will encompass both how much information the university provides and also whether the students are interested enough and care enough to want to know more. Universities which have been successful in the Green League have been criticised by some for failure to communicate This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor andFrancis in Environmental Education Research, available at: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13504622.2017.1395394?journalCode=ceer20 effectively with their students (Jones 2015). These questions directly address the issue of whether the perceptions of students about their university's activities are consistent with its ranking.…”

“…The danger of such awards is in giving the sense that, first there is a final end point or state, and second, that it has been achieved, and therefore there is little more to be done … (Sterling et al 2013, 41) Other concerns about the Green League have been raised, most recently by Jones (2015), suggesting that successful performers in this league might be pursuing short term 'technical carbon fixes' at the expense of longer term, more holistic approaches to sustainability. Furthermore, the use of league tables indicates a focusing of attention upon measurable criteria which may or may not achieve the desired outcomes:…”

Book Review: Heidegger and executive education: The management of time

“…To me, reviewing this book held out the promise of killing two philosophical bugbears with one philosopher’s stone. I could use issues familiar from critical studies of higher education (Alvesson, 2013; Davies and Petersen, 2005; Jones, 2015) to get into Heidegger, and Heidegger to contemplate my profession.…”