AN EXPLORATION OF COMPETENCIES IN SUSTAINABILITY

Working Paper2014-2015

Authors:Elyzabeth Engle

Susannah BarsomLydia Vandenbergh

Glenn Sterner Theodore Alter

with contributions fromRobert Andrejewski

Taylor Griffon Amy Hopf

April 1, 2016

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. Executive

Summary……………………………………………………………...3

II. Introduction……………………………………………………………………….

.4

III. Literature

Review……………………………………………………………….11

IV. Preliminary Conceptual

Framework……………………………………….19

V. Methods…………………………………………………………………………...

21

VI. Results……………………………………………………………………………..

24

VII. Applications of the

Framework……………………………………………..31

VIII. Discussion and Next

Steps…………………………………………………...33

IX. References……………………………………………………………………..…

37

X. Appendices…………………………………………………………………..

…..42

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I. Executive Summary

Over the past few decades, the general public has become increasingly aware of and concerned about a lack of sustainability in environmental, social, and economic spheres of our society. In that context sustainability has become a critical issue in higher education curriculum and organizational culture, as well as in workforce development at small and large businesses, agencies and government. The importance and contestedness of sustainability drives the need for a common understanding of sustainability concepts, including core sustainability competencies—the skills, knowledge, attitudes and behaviors (Davis et al. 2004)—that provide a distinct and recognizable language and mission across these various efforts.

In response to that need, this work aimed to develop and foster a common language for sustainability competencies and an overarching framework that may be applied in many ways across the University. The research methods included a literature review of relevant scholarly and grey literature related to sustainability competencies within higher education and workforce development; nine semi-structured key informant interviews with sustainability experts within and outside of Penn State; and four focus groups with members of the Penn State faculty and staff to construct and develop a conceptual framework of meta-competencies for sustainability.

The resulting conceptual framework included five meta-competencies for sustainability: systems thinking, temporal thinking, interpersonal literacy, ethical literacy, and creativity/imagination. The first four were identified by recurrence throughout the literature review; the fifth meta-competency was added after it was identified through a thematic analysis of the key informant interviews. Overall, the interview and focus group participants had a positive view of the need for common sustainability competencies and/or incorporation of these competencies into University operations and teaching. There was, however, general concern about top-level administrative buy-in and the potential top-down methods by which the competencies framework might be instituted.

From the outset, the goals of this project, and even the nature of the subject matter—competencies for sustainability—were intended to be evolving concepts, and the exercise was explicitly referred to as an iterative process. Therefore, our results offer a starting point for future exploration, discussion, application, and continued development of the competencies framework. We identify a number of future actions, including further research on the competencies framework itself; incorporation of the framework into administrative processes and curriculum across the University; and development methods for assessing the identified competencies.

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II. Introduction

Over the past few decades, the general public has become increasingly aware of and concerned about a perceived lack of sustainability in environmental, social, and economic spheres of our society. As the discussion about concepts of sustainability and whether we can live sustainably gains greater momentum, our attention is drawn to some fundamental questions, including what is it that is being sustained, who is doing the sustaining, and for whom. This ambiguity about the meaning of sustainability has created a need for a common understanding of what sustainability is, how it is pursued, how we discuss it and how we incorporate it into our educational, professional, and personal development as citizens.

Sustainability has become a critical issue in higher education curriculum and organizational culture, as well as in workforce development at small and large businesses, agencies and government. Its near-ubiquity drives the need for a set of core competencies—the skills, knowledge, attitudes and behaviors (Davis et al. 2004)—that provide a distinct and recognizable language and mission across these various sustainability efforts. To address that need, we have begun the task of describing competencies that, taken together, define the foundation of sustainable decision-making and behavior.

Sustainability as an Emerging Priority

In 2002, the United Nations declared a Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014), emphasizing the integration of sustainability education into all levels and contexts of learning (Anderson 2015). Subsequently, the National Council for Science and the Environment hosted a conference on ‘Education for a Sustainable and Secure Future,’ during which the U.S. Partnership for Education for Sustainable Development was established (Rowe 2007). This network of individuals, organizations, and institutions launched three major efforts, including the Higher Education Associations Sustainability Consortium (HEASC), the Disciplinary Associations Network for Sustainability (DANS), and the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE). Each of these movements is aimed at integrating sustainable development into all aspects of higher education, from curriculum to professional development to operations and campus activities (Rowe 2007; Anderson 2015).

The growing number of academic programs in sustainability science, sustainability studies, and sustainable development also provides evidence of the increased interest in and commitment to sustainability in higher education. Courses focused explicitly on sustainability have been taught for many years, but only during the past decade have comprehensive academic programs in sustainability begun to emerge (Wiek et al. 2011). According to AASHE (2015), their database contains 1447 sustainability-focused academic

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programs across 467 campuses in 66 states and provinces. These programs include associate, baccalaureate, and graduate degrees, as well as minors, certificates, and specializations across a large number of academic disciplines. In an effort to provide a consistent basis for assessment and comparison across programs that are labeled ‘sustainability,’ some scholars have begun to develop pedagogical and methodological approaches that are grounded in adaptable and responsive sustainability competency frameworks (Frisk and Larson 2011; Wiek et al. 2011). These works have served as models for our own efforts to create a framework for understanding and applying concepts of sustainability.

Although some higher education sustainability advocates may suggest that education for sustainability will be the “saviour to all our problems” (Jucker 2002:9), efforts to lay a coherent foundation for understanding the importance of sustainability are occurring beyond the academy. Sustainability is a topic of increasing importance within workforce training. Internationally, CEOs rank broadening the capacity of their work force as their top challenge. In two of their past reports, GreenBiz has found that roughly 50 percent of companies place some or a great deal, of value on a job candidate’s sustainability knowledge (Davies 2014). Several studies show that the rising generation of workers is seeking work that is more socially and personally meaningful (Net Impact 2010). Meanwhile, recent Gallup Polls have shown increasing rates of employee dissatisfaction with their jobs; this is seen as a threat to retention rates, organizational stability and profits (Adkins 2015). Across the US, and internationally, businesses are finding greater alignment of productivity and engagement through the integration of sustainability concepts into employee training (Savitz and Weber 2013). According to a recent report by Ceres (2013), 40 percent of companies surveyed attempted to engage employees on sustainability issues last year.

Penn State University & Sustainability

Penn State University is somewhat representative of national and international sustainability trends for higher education institutions and for workforce development. Four years ago an ad hoc committee appointed by the Provost produced The Penn State Sustainability Strategic Plan (PSU Sustainability Council 2012). At that time, PSU had no single entity committed to infusing sustainability across all University functions; but in order to most efficiently implement the strategic plan, it was clear that the various units working on sustainability ought to form a single institute with an overarching vision and mission. To that end, the Center for Sustainability (charged with overseeing academic initiatives in sustainability), the Campus Sustainability Office (concerned with sustainable operations), and representatives of the University’s outreach and research missions were brought together as Penn State’s Sustainability Institute.

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Text Box 1. (PSU Sustainability Council 2012)

While the Sustainability Institute’s ultimate mission mirrors the University’s Sustainability Strategic Plan, it has had to determine what work could be accomplished in the foreseeable future, and from this develop a realistic strategic plan.

Text Box 2. (PSU Sustainability Institute 2014)

Sustainability Competencies for the Penn State Community

Our current competencies project is not the first effort to define sustainability competencies at Penn State. In 2012, a group of faculty from several PSU campuses came together to discuss principles for teaching Sustainability 200, the foundational course for the Intercollege Minor in Sustainability Leadership. The result was a set of four sustainability competencies and four leadership competencies that would be emphasized in the foundations course and across the minor as a whole:

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Penn State’s Sustainability Strategic Plan

Vision: Penn State’s vision is to embed sustainability as a fundamental value at the University through the development of sustainability literacy, solutions, and leadership.

Mission: This comprehensive integration of sustainability into the University’s research, teaching, outreach, and operations will prepare students, faculty, and staff to be sustainability leaders.

Definition: Sustainability is the simultaneous pursuit of human health and happiness, environmental quality, and economic well-being for current and future generations.

Penn State’s Sustainability Institute’s Strategic Plan

The Sustainability Institute’s mission is to lead and support Penn State in the pursuit of sustainability across all functions (teaching and learning, research and discovery, outreach and engagement, administration and operations).

We achieve this mission by developing lifetime competencies for sustainability in our faculty, staff, and students; enabling transformation and alignment of systems, policies, and opportunities around sustainability; inspiring others through the communication of our successes, failures, and learning; and demonstrating the value of this approach at the individual, institutional, and global scales.

Text Box 3. (PSU Center for Sustainability 2012)

Competency development has also been a topic discussed in the PSU Finance and Business unit’s current focus on change management. Their work has highlighted a need for new training programs for change leaders, managers and contributors, and other members of the workforce. In response, the Sustainability Institute and the Center for Workforce Learning and Performance, already collaborating on employee programs that cultivate sustainability skills and knowledge, are planning to include sustainability competencies in the design of new training programs that are intended to encourage a common understanding of sustainability.

In 2014, the director of the Penn State’s Sustainability Institute tasked a small research team with defining competencies for sustainability that could be applied across the functions of the University. With prompting from the Office of Undergraduate Education and in consultation with the Office of Human Resources, we began to outline the process of formalizing the overarching concepts that together define competency in sustainability.

Sustainability: Complexity and Contestedness

Clearly, there is an increasing and broad agreement that sustainability is a pressing priority for higher education institutions and organizations. There is less broad agreement on how to define, interpret and act on sustainability. Perhaps most commonly used definition is of sustainable development, which “meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs,” as described in the Bruntland Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED 1987). This formalization is often translated as the triple bottom line, or the three legs or pillars, of economy, society, and environment (Elkington 1994), or as three nested fields, with environment encompassing human society, of which the economy is but one part (Giddings et al. 2002). Penn State’s own

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Sustainability: Formulate and articulate a working, evolving definition of sustainability, and apply

this concept in a variety of contexts Understand and analyze complex interactions (aka, systems thinking) Use sustainability measures and metrics in analyses and decision-making Explain the ethical dimensions of sustainability—the reasons that we (should) care

about this

Leadership: Articulate a defined self-concept that includes one’s connections to community

and to place Solve problems collaboratively and effectively Describe and respond to different styles of leadership and group dynamics Facilitate change in multiple settings

definition of sustainability is based on this model:

Sustainability is the simultaneous pursuit of human health and happiness, environmental quality, and economic well being for current and future generations (University Sustainability Council 2012).

A number of other illustrations and applications of the concepts of sustainability and sustainable development in action exist (Bridger & Luloff 1999; Buckland 2015; Davies 2013; Ehrenfeld 2008; Heinberg 2010; Mathews 2014; Natural Step 2015; Orr 1992). Each application allows for a different answer to the question of what it is that we are sustaining as it focuses on different challenges of sustainability within our organizations and communities.

What is meant by sustainability, and whether or not it even has a precise meaning, is a complex and contested issue in both theory and practice. While some focus on environmental dimensions of sustainability, others are concerned with the socio-political context, and still others believe that economic issues drive all others. Although these different points of view create a sense of contestedness about sustainability and sustainable development, they are all important and interconnected areas. An essential challenge of sustainability and sustainable development is to work and behave individually and collectively at the intersection of these three realms in a way that addresses both the short-term limits of social, political and economic systems and the long-term constraints of the environment.

Sustainability is one of many challenging, complicated concepts that face human society. Comparable challenges emerge around other complex concepts that rely for their interpretation on individual worldviews; difficult-to-define ideas such as duty, art, loyalty, democracy and justice come to mind. Contestedness and complexity are not signs that sustainability has lost its meaning or potency in our society, any more than justice or the other concepts have lost meaning or potency. In all of these cases, contestedness arises from a tension between idealism and pragmatism; but this tension is not inherently negative. Neither can it be easily, nor perhaps ever, resolved; it is an ongoing discussion and initiative. The focus on the complexity and contestedness intrinsic to sustainability affords the opportunity for dialogue and debate across differing perspectives, which are truly at the heart of collective learning and social change.

Our work on sustainability competencies—the skills, knowledge, attitudes and behaviors associated with sustainability (Davis et al. 2004)—does not assume or impose a strict definition of sustainability. Instead, the intention is to describe how people envision and act on their own understandings of sustainability through their work and experiences, within and outside of the context of an institution of higher education. At the same time, a foundation

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of common terms—a common language of sustainability—is a prerequisite for these ongoing discussions about how best to act on sustainability issues. This project, therefore, is a starting point for further discussion within The Pennsylvania State University about the core competencies for sustainability, and the contested nature of sustainability and of its related key competencies. It is this university-wide conversation that is a necessary forerunner to lasting change in attitudes, understanding, and behavior related to sustainability. And in the context of an institution of Penn State’s size and influence, there is the possibility that these lasting changes will ultimately have a vast impact on a sustainable future.

A Road Map Forward

From the outset, the goals of this project, and even the nature of the subject matter (competencies for sustainability), were intended to be evolving concepts, and the exercise was explicitly referred to as an iterative process. What has been most apparent is that in order to develop transformational programming and to cultivate change agency for sustainability, we must be able to articulate the skills, knowledge, attitudes and behaviors (Davis et al. 2004) —the competencies—that are requisite for this work. Our overall objective, in alignment with the Sustainability Institute’s strategic plan, was and is to identify competencies and implementation tools that can guide the development and adoption of sustainability curriculum and practice (PSU Sustainability Institute 2014).

Specifically, we drew on expertise from across and outside of the University in order to identify and define sustainability competencies for a variety of audiences. The process began with a literature review of relevant academic and grey literature encompassing past work on sustainability competencies, and a small benchmarking project to identify sustainability competencies integration at other institutions of higher education and within workforce development organizations. Using this information as a base, we constructed our own preliminary conceptual framework, and next conducted semi-structured interviews with sustainability experts from within and outside of Penn State to learn more about how they perceived and integrated sustainability competencies within their professional and personal lives. Following a thematic analysis of the interview transcripts, we made adjustments to the next iteration of our conceptual framework and sought feedback through focus group meetings involving Penn State faculty and staff involved in sustainability research and work. These results informed our final conceptual framework and possible applications, as discussed at this end of this paper.

In sum, this project is developing and fostering a common language for sustainability competencies and a versatile framework that may be applied in many ways across the university. We believe this common language and

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understanding are necessary for creating (and achieving) common purpose across the Institution as a whole. One of the main goals of this work is to create a welcoming environment where all members of the community are invited to participate in the work of sustainability, and all are able to see their own role in that work.

We see many possible applications of the sustainability competencies framework within existing and new initiatives across all University functions and programs, including but not limited to:

Sustainable institutional processes for leadership, planning, and decision-making

Courses, assignments, other educational materials, that have sustainability learning outcomes

Professional development and training programs for all faculty and staff

Job descriptions, annual evaluations, and delineation of job responsibilities

Co-curricular student programs Outreach, extension, and other community engagement programs that

have sustainability learning outcomes Alumni engagement Assessment tools that can be used for any initiative that includes

sustainability-related approaches

Audience for This Work

The work on competencies is intended to foster a community in which people are able to connect their work at the University with larger issues in sustainability, see how they can live and work in a more sustainable way, and influence others to reflect on the environmental, social and economic impact of their own actions. We envision a community that is empowered by this sense of connection and by the support of a University administration that values its agents of change for a sustainable world.

It is clear from even this brief accounting that there are numerous stakeholders in this process, including students, faculty, staff, alumni, community members, administration officials and trustees. Most of them are members of the University community; all are affected by the actions of the University community.

Early in the process, we had conversations with staff from the Office of Human Resources, who gave us their views on using competencies in employee training, evaluation, and hiring. They welcomed a competencies framework, and described some of their own history of using job competencies as an approach to training and development.

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The students who have the opportunity to make Penn State a more sustainable place will leave here with knowledge of the competencies for sustainability, and how to apply them, as well as an understanding that this is an important way to make decisions and to act in the world. Their key contributions to Penn State’s process of moving toward a more sustainable state are asking the right questions of all of us, and mentoring one another along the way. And these Penn State graduates will leave this place with the understanding that it is possible to change the way things are done and the knowledge of how to do that.

Faculty members contribute through their ability to see, and act on, possibilities to connect with sustainability concepts and issues in their teaching and in their research. Their key contributions include asking the right questions of our leaders, but they are also in a position to talk about sustainability—and to be heard. As instructors they can demonstrate the competencies needed to identify connections between a broad range of ideas and sustainability. And they can ask that students learn to do this, too. Faculty members who view their work through the lens of sustainability are rewarded with new insights into their own disciplines, and into their teaching and research. In discussing these issues in the context of their classes, they are sharing their insights, and helping to solve the problems.

Staff members who cultivate their understanding of the competencies for sustainability and apply it to their work will make Penn State a more sustainable place. Their main contributions to Penn State’s culture of sustainability may come through exemplifying sustainable practices in their work, and informing and encouraging other members of the community. Their work in creating a culture of sustainability sets a foundation for the work of students and faculty. They are essential role models for the students who will go on to become sustainability examples for their own co-workers in the future.

III. Literature Review

There is a growing body of literature that articulates key issues and controversies associated with sustainability competencies, both within and outside of higher education settings. We have reviewed primarily the academic literature on sustainability competency development, much of which is written in terms of competencies for a higher-education setting. But because our framework will be used for applications in both curricular and workforce development, we have included some investigation into the approaches to competency development used by governmental, business and non-governmental organizations.

Competencies: Definition & Challenges

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Competencies, at the most elemental level, encompass the “clusters of skills, knowledge, abilities, and behaviors” that people need to be successful in a particular endeavor (Davis et al. 2004). Competencies are important for defining specific jobs or professions; they provide a common language for describing work performance and serve as a guide for identifying those knowledge, skills, and behaviors that practitioners need to excel in their work.

The concepts of key competencies and meta-competencies (or competences) are also important to the work of defining competencies for sustainability. Meta-competencies are described as generic and over-arching competencies, typically having to do with notions of learning to learn and coping with uncertainty; Brown (1993) describes them as higher-order abilities that are related to being able to learn, anticipate, create and adapt, as opposed to having the specific skills needed to complete particular tasks. Meta-competencies reflect the cognitive processes of the work, particularly processes of learning; thus it is possible to identify broad, foundational meta-competencies for any area of work. And it is likely that these foundational meta-competencies will be applicable to many areas of work.

Barth explains that key competencies are “in contrast to ordinary competencies – relevant across different spheres of life and are important for all individuals… [They] do not substitute [for] domain-specific competences which are necessary for successful action in particular situations and contexts, they rather have a different, wider focus” (2009:96). Key competencies, then, may be understood in specific contexts through the identification of appropriate sub-competencies. In enumerating the sub-competencies required for successful execution of job responsibilities, the overarching key competencies may be verified and assessed. The work of developing frameworks for describing and explaining competencies, therefore, is an important research and practical endeavor.

Further, basic key competencies may be distinct from key competencies for sustainability. Wiek and colleagues (2011:204), drew upon Dale and Newman (2005), Rowe (2007), and Barth et al. (2007), to distinguish between these two types of competencies. First, they defined key competencies as “a functionally linked complex of knowledge, skills, and attitudes that enable successful performance and problem solving.” To apply this concept more directly to key competencies for sustainability, they characterize the successful performance and problem solving, “with respect to real-world sustainability problems, challenges, and opportunities” (Wiek et al. 2011:204). The authors argued that because sustainability problems and challenges have specific characteristics that differentiate them from issues in other fields, addressing issues in sustainability requires “a particular set of interlinked and interdependent key competencies” that are separate from

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basic or other field-specific competency models (Wiek et al. 2011:204). While we recognize that this may be the case, we suggest that the context and the linkages—the applications—are what distinguish sustainability key or meta-competencies from other organizational key competencies.

One of our significant challenges lies in developing meta- or key competencies for sustainability that can be made relevant to a wide variety of practitioners at Penn State, and then identifying sub-competencies that operationalize these key competencies within the specific contexts of the work of these practitioners. In order to ensure that as a community we are speaking the same dialect of sustainability, our use of the terms associated with sustainability competencies should be consistent, whether we are professors of engineering, deans, HVAC specialists, or first-year students. We refer to competencies because we want faculty and staff to exhibit them in the execution of their work, and because they are what we want graduates to have when they leave the University. This approach ultimately provides benefits to the University: people perform their work in a mindful manner that incorporates sustainability competencies, and in the process they model these competencies for students and others.

Sustainability Competencies in Higher Education & Workforce Development

While institutions of higher education can make large strides in sustainability research, engagement, and operations, their largest potential impact—and largest challenge—is arguably in educating students about sustainability in an effective and meaningful manner (AASHE 2010). In light of this fact, a number of institutions have researched, analyzed, published, and implemented their own interpretations of core competencies for use in curricular and extra-curricular application; we have reviewed a number of these in our benchmarking process.

Cornell University (2015), for example, has developed in their institutional strategic plan a set of core competencies that form a foundation for preparing students to understand and address problems in a changing world. They have organized these competencies into two categories—academic and personal:

Academic Competencies Disciplinary knowledge Critical thinking Communication Skills Scientific and quantitative reasoning Self-directed learning Information literacy Engagement in the process of discovery or creation

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Personal Competencies Multicultural competence Moral and ethical awareness Self-management Community engagement

Although Cornell’s core competencies are intended for its entire student body, Arizona State University’s Sustainability Science Education, or SSE, Project has developed a more specific model, the Sustainability Education Framework for Teachers, SEFT (Warren et al. 2014). The goal of the SEFT “is to build a capacity for teachers to be able to approach: (i) the broad, complex nature of sustainability, (ii) the problem-oriented, solution-driven nature of sustainability, and (iii) how sustainability connects to them as both citizens and classroom teachers” (Warren et al. 2014). The SEFT promotes four competencies, or as the authors describe them, four ways of thinking: futures (or foresight), values (or ethical), systems (or holistic), and strategic. While these different types of thinking are often considered separately, the authors of this framework argued that an approach that integrates all four is more robust and effective. Each of these four types of thinking is realized through subsets of specific abilities, as described by Warren and colleagues (2015).

While Cornell (2015) and ASU (2015) have frameworks of core competencies that have been conceived for somewhat broad audiences, some institutions have generated sustainability competencies for specific courses or academic programs. A panel discussion at the 2012 AASHE conference brought together five faculty members, each of whom has taught an introduction to sustainability course at his or her institution (Schrand et al. 2013). When asked about the essential learning objectives for such a course, Geoffrey Habron (Michigan State University) identified eight competencies that were identified as either content-area competencies or process-based competencies:

Content-Area Competencies Ecological integrity Economic vitality Social equity Aesthetic understanding

Process-Based Competencies Civic engagement Systems thinking Critical thinking Personal development

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Other panelists subsequently emphasized the importance of systems and critical thinking as competencies for sustainability, as well as interdisciplinary knowledge and understanding. These competencies reflect similar ones outlined in the Cornell framework above, particularly in regard to critical thinking and self-development.

Within specific academic programs that have developed sustainability competencies, we see similar concepts. Habron (2012) documented the emergence and focus of a new undergraduate specialization in sustainability at Michigan State University, which employed a competencies-based approach using portfolios to assess student learning. This program is built on the eight competencies listed above, and each competency encompasses seven to eight learning tasks of increasing complexity. As Habron (2012:380) explained:

For example, critical thinking has seven associated tasks numbered 2.1-2.7. While task 2.1 requires students to simply, “define and explain critical thinking and the indicators one can use to identify critical thinking in the works of others,” task 2.6 requires students to develop a higher order task: propose a plan of action to mediate multiple stakeholder concerns.

A similar set of competencies is found in Chatham University’s (2015) list of competencies for their Master of Sustainability program. In addition to the virtually ubiquitous systems thinking, that program emphasizes particular skills and ways of thinking, including: communication; teamwork and transformative leadership; creativity; ethics; conceptualizing sustainability; transdisciplinarity and collaboration; and application and assessment.

In regard to operationalizing these competencies, Wright and Defields (2012) performed a Delphi study at Dalhousie University so that faculty could dictate the key knowledge, concepts, dispositions, and skills to be incorporated into its new Environment, Sustainability and Society (ESS) program. This process delivered a more applied list of 59 items that ought to be incorporated into ESS curriculum, many of which “echo[ed] the language of current sustainability rhetoric (i.e., fairness and equity, concern for future generations), while others delve more deeply into ethics (i.e., respect for all living things) and the way in which the panelists wish students to conduct themselves in the world (i.e., don’t be afraid to question current ideals, hope, humanity)” (Wright & Defields 2012:109). Interdisciplinary knowledge of physical and social systems also was a core theme among these 59 items.

In another approach to defining sustainability competencies, authors addressed these concepts from a wider, more normative lens, spelling out the core competencies that should be included in sustainability curricula across institutions. For example, Barth et al. (2007) discussed the process of

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sustainability competence acquisition, and the importance of particular pedagogical approaches in both formal and informal learning settings. They considered the necessity of an interdisciplinary orientation within formal learning, but also the need for self-reliance and self-direction in more informal learning settings, such as the pursuit of self-directed and experiential learning opportunities and the acquisition of values, attitudes, behaviors, and skills.

We found that many of these discussions of competencies and values are repeated in corporate workforce development materials. As our own project is not limited to curricular applications, we reviewed how some businesses and their affiliates define similar sustainability competencies. An Ashridge Report (Wilson, Lenssen, & Hind 2006) on corporate social responsibility (CSR), for example, included the following competencies that are thought to be essential in integrating social and environmental considerations into core business decision-making:

Systemic thinking Embracing diversity and managing risk Balancing global and local perspectives Meaningful dialogue and developing a new language Emotional awareness

Strandberg Consulting (2015) had identified a similar list of five core competencies that they deem as “essential for any organization as they update their talent management strategies and traverse the dynamic sustainability terrain ahead” (Weinreb 2015), including:

Systems thinking: Connected, holistic, multidisciplinary thinking External collaboration: Willingness to work with entities beyond

business Social innovation: Redesign of products and processes that create

business and social value Sustainability literacy: Aware of emerging environmental and social

trends and the risks and opportunities they create Active values: Mindful of emotions and motivations and is sensitive to

those of others

Similarly, in a 2012 report on sustainability and leadership competencies for business leaders, Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) highlighted the competencies that characterize leaders of corporations that are “recognized for being at, or actively working toward, the leading edge of corporate responsibility and sustainability” (Faruk and Hoffman 2012). They identified the competencies most often associated with progressive leaders in corporate responsibility and sustainability:

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External awareness and appreciation of trends Visioning and strategy formulation Risk awareness, assessment and management Stakeholder engagement Flexibility and adaptability Ethics and integrity

As a final example of sustainability competencies for workforce and/or corporate development, the International Society of Sustainability Professionals conducted a research study that culminated in a 2010 Competency Survey Report. This research team surveyed over 400 sustainability professionals about what competencies were needed to support sustainable development and sustainable practices within government and industry sectors. The ISSP differentiated the main competencies of interest into two pre-defined categories: hard skills and soft skills. The most prominent hard skills included (1) strategic planning, (2) systems thinking, and (3) project management. Overall, soft skills were deemed to be more important than hard, and the most critical of these included (1) communication with stakeholders, (2) problem solving, and (3) inspiring and motivating others.

As with many of the higher education sustainability competency frameworks, the corporate and workforce development frameworks consist of lists of abilities, skills, and characteristics related to sustainability understanding and action. Some of these abilities are the very broad, comprehensive and inclusive key competencies that we anticipated finding; others delineate skills that might be described as context-specific realizations of key competencies that have not yet been developed or named.

In addition to our research on the ways that competencies for sustainability have been defined, we looked for works that included comprehensive literature reviews of overarching themes in sustainability competency frameworks; many of these works revisit the same competencies that we saw in the higher education and workforce development materials described above. For example, in their article on competencies for sustainability education, Frisk and Larson (2011) briefly review the literature of sustainability competencies. In developing their framework for K-12 sustainability education, they settle on four key competencies:

Systems thinking and an understanding of interconnectedness, Long-term, foresighted reasoning and strategizing, Stakeholder engagement and group collaboration, and Action-orientation and change-agent skills.

(Please see Appendix A for more information.)

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An even more comprehensive review was conducted by Wiek et al. (2011). In this work, the authors argued for a more synthesized, coherent sustainability competencies framework for higher education that moves beyond the typical “laundry lists” that are seen in many of the examples listed above (Wiek et al. 2011:204). Incorporating both peer-reviewed and gray literature, university websites, and curriculum publications (43 documents in all), they identified five key sustainability research and problem-solving competencies, including a description and justification for each, as well as an explanation of how these five competencies are related to one another. These five competencies overlap with many of those discussed above, and included:

Systems-thinking competence Anticipatory competence Normative competence Strategic competence Interpersonal competence

(Please see Appendix B for more information.)

Wiek and colleagues made it clear that this competency framework is in fact a conceptual framework and not just a list, and that it necessarily includes interconnections among these key competencies. Their model described the fifth key competency – interpersonal – as the one that most clearly cuts across the other four competencies – systems thinking, anticipatory, normative, and strategic (see Figure 1). According to these authors, interpersonal competence is what allows individuals to connect and operationalize key competencies and basic competencies (more foundational academic skills) in a way that successfully supports sustainability research and problem solving.

Figure 1. (Wiek et al. 2011:214)

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Beyond using their literature review to develop the competencies listed above, these authors also identified a number of shortcomings in the sustainability competency literature, including “a lack of empirical evidence, depth, and rigor in the discourse on key competencies” (Wiek et al. 2011:212). They pointed out that the literature fails to demonstrate how these competencies foster successful sustainability action, and whether graduates actually develop this competence through the course of their educations. They also suggested that the literature is lacking in discussion of both the operationalization of these key competencies and the theoretical justifications for their definition and importance.

IV. Preliminary Conceptual Framework

Like Wiek et al. (2011), we discovered that much of the higher education and workforce development literature is primarily descriptive, and has yet to include theoretical or evidence-based discourse on the usefulness of sustainability competency frameworks. In fact, we found Wiek and his colleagues to have produced the most thorough academic discussion of sustainability competencies. Our own analysis was developed with the previous work in mind and with the intention of making a contribution to the literature on sustainability competencies, in addition to the primary goal of developing a workable model for our own university. Our work in this project, and moving forward, addresses operationalization and measurement of sustainability competencies by learning from those who teach and/or practice these competencies.

For the development of our initial version of a competencies framework, we incorporated lessons learned from the benchmarking and literature review processes, drawing largely upon the work of Wiek et al. (2011) because of its comprehensive and descriptive nature. While this work is probably most similar to what we are hoping to develop, neither it nor the other works that we reviewed specifically set out to provide competencies for a broad stakeholder audience, as we were doing.

Our preliminary framework included four key competencies for sustainability, as drawn from the academic and gray literature discussed above:

Systems Thinking is the capacity to comprehend and analyze complex systems across different domains and at multiple scales. This competency also encompasses the understanding of interconnectedness and ripple effects, including the fact that decisions in one realm necessarily affect other realms (Frisk and Larson 2011). The systems-thinking competency allows individuals to analyze multiple objectives and outcomes as part of a decision-making process, at individual, organizational, and population levels. This competency is

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mentioned in nearly all of the resources reviewed above (in both higher education and workforce development literature). It is essential to successful sustainable development, and we would expect to find it—if not as “systems thinking,” then as another term—in any rudimentary set of sustainability competencies

Temporal Thinking is the ability to understand and draw upon past states and narratives and to anticipate future societies, environments and situations. While other frameworks, including that of Wiek and his colleagues (2011), refer to this competency as anticipatory or future-thinking, we found that temporal allows for consideration of both past and future scenarios, not simply the latter. References to past as well as future refer to the close link between the temporal-thinking competency and systems thinking. Though temporal competencies were not universal in the literature that we reviewed, the fact that a temporal dimension is integral to the very concept of sustainability convinced us that this competency is necessary to a complete framework. Temporal thinking emphasizes the consequences of a set of actions over time: the ability to extract and apply lessons from the past, as well as the ability to envision situations that may result from current decisions and actions.

Interpersonal Literacy refers to the capacity for comprehending, motivating, supporting, relating to, and communicating across a diverse range of individuals, networks, political systems and other organizations. Because issues of sustainability are created by, and affect, multiple groups of people with different backgrounds, values, and motivations, the ability to communicate and stimulate action across these diverse populations is essential to sustainable development. Successfully fostering mutual understanding and acceptance across a diverse group of stakeholders requires advanced ability in communication and empathy. While this specific competency was not referred to as interpersonal literacy on many of the lists and frameworks reviewed above, elements of it are found within all of them; other frameworks have used terms such as emotional awareness, engagement, collaboration, meaningful dialogue, and interdisciplinary knowledge.

Ethical Literacy is the ability to identify, assess, apply and reconcile values and goals in the context of sustainability. Having competence in this area allows individuals to weigh the relative importance of different sustainability elements (broadly speaking, environmental, social, and economic) of a system or situation in terms of right and wrong. While Wiek and colleagues (2011) describe this competence as normative (and indeed any discussion of ethics is likely to be at least somewhat normative), it is possible for these issues to be discussed

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objectively, in a manner not overly concerned with moral pronouncements. At the same time, we recognize that the very concept of sustainability is “unavoidably value laden and normative, since it addresses the question of how social-ecological systems ought to be developed, so that they balance and even enhance socio-economic activities and environmental capacities” (Wiek et al. 2011:209). While there is potential for confusion around interpretations of ethical literacy, this competency is essential to our own framework, and we have been careful to describe it in a way that conveys its significance to the broad audience we hope to serve.

It is clear that we relied heavily on the work of Wiek and colleagues (2011), whose framework of was developed in the context of sustainability research, problem-solving, and civic action. While these were important considerations in the evolution of our framework as well, we included a focus on individual development, growth and behavior change; the competencies that are part of our framework, have been specifically identified and defined to be applicable to sustainability endeavors among students, faculty and staff at Penn State University.

Like other authors (Brundiers and Wiek 2011; Wiek et al. 2011), our preliminary framework assumed that a certain basic level of competence, reflecting education and ability, is already present to support the development of meta-competencies in sustainability. These basic competencies include, but are not limited to reading, writing, logical thinking, critical thinking, quantitative analysis, reasoning, et cetera. We consider these basic competencies to be the tools through which the sustainability competencies are acquired and applied.

V. Methods

This research process involved multiple phases, beginning with the background literature review and benchmarking of similar processes at other institutions of higher education. To evaluate and build upon the literature and conceptual framework developed within this initial stage, we embarked on an exploratory, iterative, and largely qualitative research process that relied on key informant interviews and focus groups.

Literature Review & Institutional Benchmarking

As already described, small research team at Penn State’s Sustainability Institute began the initial literature review in the summer of 2014. The team identified, read, and discussed academic and professional materials at regular meetings. These readings formed the foundation for the development of the initial competencies framework used in future phases of

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the research process. Their research also included a benchmarking process through which they sought information on uses of competency models that other institutions make in their work. Information on this process and its findings are discussed in the literature review.

This work became the foundation for the development of our initial competencies framework (as outlined in the previous section), which was used in concert with key informant interviews and focus groups.

Key Informant Interviews

In the summer of 2014, we began to compile a database of sustainability experts (people whose work includes teaching, scholarly writings and lectures in the field of sustainability); most of them are at Penn State and its adjacent communities, on the Sustainability Institute’s advisory board, or at other institutions of higher education. People on that list met some or all of the following criteria:

Expertise in some aspect of sustainability Sustainability as significant part of their professional and/or personal

endeavors Significant contributions to sustainability thinking/literature Membership on the Sustainability Institute’s Advisory Board or other

advisory boards Leadership role related to sustainability (at an institution of higher

education or other organization)

The database consisted of people known to the Sustainability Institute staff members in a professional capacity; it was then further populated via snowball sampling, as the identified experts informally suggested additional experts.

In order to learn more about these experts’ views on sustainability and the related competencies, we constructed a protocol for key informant interviews—and for subsequent focus groups—that was submitted to Penn State’s Institutional Review Board for approval. By identifying overlapping areas of expertise among these key informants, we were able to decrease the total number of interviewees.

Since the summer of 2014 we have conducted nine key informant interviews with selected experts from our database. This key informant sub-sample was constructed using purposive and convenience methods of sampling based primarily on the level of sustainability expertise and various formal and informal leadership roles in regard to sustainability, with some consideration given to institutional representation and placement within organizational charts (Creswell 2012). One competencies team member

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conducted these interviews, during which the key informants were asked a series of open-ended questions about what he or she considers to be competencies in sustainability; which competencies are most necessary to success on the job; how sustainability competencies are used in his or her professional, personal, and civic life; what his or her (academic) unit has to contribute uniquely to Penn State’s understanding of sustainability; and what he or she does in the face of frustrations when these sustainability competencies are not in evidence. (The questionnaire is found in Appendix C.)

These interviews lasted between 20 and 120 minutes in length; they were audio recorded and later transcribed by members of the team. The competencies research team then discussed the key informants’ responses in order to identify major themes relating to our key competencies, which were then used to further develop the conceptual framework before its use in the focus groups. The team focused on filling in example sub-competencies to help explain possible ways to operationalize the meta-competencies; this was intended to support understanding and discussion in the subsequent phases of data collection, a process supported by Barth (2009).

Before embarking on the next phase of data collection, we also elicited feedback from our peers at the Sustainability Institute on the progress and analysis to date. In keeping with the goals of an iterative research process, we incorporated their comments and suggestions as appropriate.

Focus Groups

In the spring of 2015, we conducted four focus groups, with a total of 15 participants. The goal of the focus group meetings was to create an opportunity for Penn State faculty and staff to comment on the proposed sustainability competencies framework with their peers in order to refine the framework and further develop its potential applications. The participants were chosen from the expert database, in consideration of their occupation, role and work/academic unit at Penn State. To support diverse viewpoints and rich discussion, the focus groups were structured so that each would have a mixed representation of roles and units at Penn State (Creswell 2013). All participants were employed in either faculty or staff positions at Penn State University. Although all focus groups took place at University Park, participants represented Commonwealth campuses as well as University Park.

At each focus group meeting, the participants were given a printed version of our sustainability competencies framework. This printed document also included spaces where the participants wrote their own notes and identified sub-competencies within each of the meta-competencies. The framework

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and the overall research project—were explained to the participants in a short presentation at the beginning of the meeting. The rest of the time was used to discuss ideas within two overarching areas: (1) reactions to the framework, including possible missing competencies and ranking of the meta-competencies in terms of importance, and (2) the applicability of the framework within Penn State generally, and within their unit specifically, including possible ways to implement the framework, and to operationalize the meta-competencies in their own jobs and in their colleagues’ jobs. (The protocol is found in Appendix D.)

Feedback from the participants was interpreted by the focus group moderator and recorded visually on a white board in front of the participants. The white board was set up with the five meta-competencies listed across the top of the board, and space for notes beneath them. Whiteboard notes included not only direct feedback from the participants, but also additions to the framework as inferred by the moderator during the conversations among focus group participants.

The meetings each lasted 90 minutes. Participants shared their meeting notes with the investigators and were encouraged to send additional feedback they might have upon later reflection. All focus groups were audio recorded and a designated team member took written notes as well. White board notes were photographed. The collected data were analyzed for overall themes, including ideas and concerns shared by the participants about the framework itself and its application to their department/unit and to the University overall.

The final phase of this research project took place during the summer and fall of 2015. Tasks included further analysis of the key informant interviews and focus groups and edits to the conceptual framework. This phase of the project, along with recommendations for next steps for implementing the framework, culminated in the writing of this internal document/white paper.

VI. Results

Overview of Research Purpose

The complexity and scope of sustainability make it a concept that is difficult to teach and difficult to measure. Mastery of sustainability concepts is evidenced not by a grade on an exam, but by the behavior of those who have internalized these concepts. Meaningful measurement of the impact of any sustainability efforts on students, employees and the community would require longitudinal studies that include periodic follow-up interviews and observations for many years to come. As this is an unlikely scenario, we are focusing on the foundations of sustainable thinking and behavior. By

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introducing educational processes that explicitly emphasize these meta-competencies, we reinforce a holistic approach to sustainability that recognizes the importance of with competencies.

This model of educating for sustainability is becoming increasingly common both in higher education and in industry, and the literature regarding educating and training for sustainability reflects that trend. No single framework has been universally adopted, but institutions are putting their efforts into finding models that fit with their curricular or training objectives. And across these models, despite their differences, is a common focus on the capacity for understanding, learning and applying sustainability concepts, as well as on particular kinds of skills needed by individuals in the workplace.

Competencies for Sustainability: The Framework

The focus group work resulted in no major changes to the overall structure of the meta-competency framework; it did provide opportunities for us to clarify the rationale underlying our use of the terms meta-competencies, foundational competencies and task-specific competencies. The five meta-competencies (key competencies) in the framework are: systems thinking, temporal thinking, interpersonal literacy, ethical literacy and creativity. They rely on a set of foundational competencies that includes, but are not limited to, logical thinking, critical thinking, quantitative analysis and numerical reasoning, reading, writing, et cetera.

Our current framework is based on ideas emerging from our interview and focus group work, and includes a fifth key competency (in addition to systems thinking, temporal thinking, interpersonal literacy, and ethical literacy) that was not identified through the literature review process:

Creativity (Imagination) represents the ability to envision, develop and apply innovative and strategic scenarios, frameworks, questions, solutions, etc. in order to adapt to changing and challenging situations. This includes the ability to think about information in new ways that draw upon and influence the other competencies discussed above. In fact, Wiek and colleagues (2011) did mention the application of creativity, but in the context of normative and interpersonal competencies. The importance that some key informants gave to this ability encouraged us to assign it a separate meta-competency category. We became convinced that while the first four competencies are essential for understanding the nature and importance of sustainability challenges, and ways to bring about change toward a more sustainable world, without creativity, we can have no solutions to offer.

Table 1. Sustainability key competencies, descriptions and justifications

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Competency Description Justification

Systems Thinking

Ability to analyze complex systems across multiple domains and at different scales.

Necessary for understanding complexity of sustainability concepts; ubiquitous in sustainability competencies literature.

Temporal Thinking

Ability to draw upon and anticipate states and narratives of past and future societies and environments.

Emphasizes the ability to extract and apply lessons from the past and to envision the needs of people in the future and the effects of current actions on those needs.

Interpersonal Literacy

Ability to comprehend, motivate, enable, relate to, and communicate across diverse individuals, political systems and organizations.

The societal and policy changes necessary to deal with issues of sustainability require that individual sustainability advocates have the skills to negotiate complex personalities, networks, assumptions and political/power systems.

Ethical Literacy

Ability to identify and assess ethical issues and controversies (related to sustainability), and to discuss, respond to, and reconcile them, applying personal and societal values and goals.

Sustainability issues are inherently value-laden and must be analyzed through an understanding of ethics.

Creativity (Imagination)

Ability to envision, develop and apply innovative and strategic solutions, frameworks, etc. in order to adapt to changing and challenging situations.

Identified by research participants as necessary for addressing unforeseen outcomes and scenarios; not addressed in other categories.

Foundational Competencies

Expected capabilities based on education and adaptation.

These baseline abilities are needed in order to further develop meta-competencies.

Results from Field Work

Key Informant InterviewsThe key informants (KI) questionnaire is a series of open-ended questions; the intention of that format was to learn the experts’ opinions about sustainability competencies without asking leading questions that referred to

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our ongoing work on competencies. Our aim was to examine the experts’ answers and compare them with the framework we had developed based on the literature review and benchmarking. The experts that we have interviewed to date echoed many of the general ideas that we had seen in the literature and developed into our own framework.

A total of nine key informant interviews were conducted with a mix of faculty (n=5) and staff (n=4). All but two of the participants were employed at Penn State, with those from outside of Penn State being selected for their relevant expertise to the subject matter. The Penn State participants represented five different colleges (Arts and Architecture, Education, Engineering, Liberal Arts, and Life Sciences) and the Sustainability Institute.

When asked to describe what the term competencies meant to them, either directly or in the context of other questions, nearly all of the KI participants struggled to put this concept into clear words. Two participants each shared a definition very close to the one used for the basis of this project, each respectively describing the concept of competencies as “a package of knowledge, skills, and attitudes” or “skills, interests, and expertise that individuals bring to an experience.” Others offered more expanded ideas on the meaning of competencies. One participant described competencies as “something people can do, not something they can think,” while another similarly warned against “merit badge approach[es]” to competencies assessment, as he saw them as something more “broad and deep,” and not “a box you check off.”

When asked to identify competencies for sustainability, participants generally provided initial answers that were heavily influenced by their discipline and/or experience. Nearly every participant named ‘systems thinking’ as a primary sustainability competency, whether it had to do with environmental, technical, or social systems. Most participants also discussed the importance of abilities that we’ve coded into the category of ‘foundational competencies,’ such as quantitative reasoning and critical thinking. While many participants went on to name sustainability competencies that are more specific to their own fields, nearly all spent the majority of their time emphasizing the necessity of competencies that we’ve coded as ‘interpersonal literacy,’ such as compassion, leadership, ability to collaborate and work with others, ability to listen and communicate clearly and respectfully, and emotional intelligence. As one participant put it, “There are a lot of sustainability competencies that have nothing to do with [environmental] sustainability.” Similarly, when asked what competencies might be most important for their own work, several participants returned to interpersonal-literacy-related abilities—though many stressed the importance of combining several different competencies.

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As mentioned previously, in addition to the four competencies included in our initial framework—systems thinking, temporal thinking, interpersonal literacy and ethical literacy—a recurring theme with some participants was the notion of creativity or imagination. Some discussed creativity and imagination explicitly, others discussed the importance of fostering an inquisitive nature and curiosity, which we’ve coded into the category of ‘imagination,’ as the context for their discussion of these traits was similar to those in which imagination/creativity were brought up in other interviews. This led to extensive discussions about where this competency belongs—is it in the category of foundational competencies, such as critical thinking or quantitative reasoning, or does it merit its own metacompetency category; we concluded that it does in fact rise to the level of meta-competency, with the ability to envision scenarios that are not in evidence being essential for developing solutions to the complex sustainability issues facing humankind.

Key informants also found it difficult to describe how they—and others—should put the competencies they had identified into practice. Many described individual environmental behaviors, like spending time outdoors, gardening, and recycling. A couple of participants admitted that they find it challenging to follow sustainability principles in their daily lives due to competing values and/or interests. Those participants who work closely with students did share some methods that they use to build sustainability competencies among students (such as community engagement, experiential learning, and leadership development), but they did not always mention which competencies were being developed through these methods.

Similarly, when asked to describe what unique contributions their unit is making towards the development of sustainability, most pointed to actions related to some dimension of ‘systems thinking.’ Despite the weight that participants gave to ‘interpersonal literacy’ during the interview process, only two shared ways in which their unit was helping to build interpersonal literacy among the members of their institution.

Lastly, participants talked about the ways in which sustainability competencies could, and should, be integrated into common operations at the institution, such as hiring processes, the development of job descriptions, etc. They discussed the merits of sustainability training for multiple audiences, including current staff and faculty, incoming employees, and students. While several acknowledged that there would be challenges to screening for sustainability competencies in the hiring process, they still believed it could be integrated in some way, perhaps similar to the way the institution already screens for maturity, responsibility, and other competencies. One participant discussed the idea of creating a sustainability competencies rubric as a guide for interview questions and the ranking of individual job candidates.

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Other data from interviews are being analyzed and will be part of subsequent publications/discussions.

Focus Groups

The focus groups had their own contribution to make to the sustainability competencies framework. Feedback was elicited in two main areas: comments on the framework itself and thoughts on the implementation of the framework at Penn State overall and in their units in particular. Four focus groups were held on campus, with 15 participants in total. The groups were a mix of faculty (n=10) and staff (n=5). While most were in-person participants, three contributed via speakerphone because they worked at campuses other than University Park. Several different units were represented, including seven different colleges and the Office of Physical Plant.

The participants in the focus groups had a largely positive evaluation of the sustainability competencies, though several people felt that the language associated with a competency framework was unnecessarily abstract and/or confusing. For example, systems thinking is a common term that did not seem to require much explanation; there were many questions, however, about the definition and scope of temporal thinking and ethical literacy. Most participants agreed that for this framework to be accepted and applied widely, we would have to provide many examples of how the metacompetencies might be demonstrated in day-to-day activities.

When asked what, if anything, was missing from the framework, a few participants suggested that an understanding of quantitative assessment and scale might qualify as a metacompetency. We had assumed that this capacity, along with critical thinking, reading comprehension, etc., would be considered a basic skill. While we did not add mathematical skills as a meta-competency, the discussion did prompt us to add the foundational competencies category (as seen in Table 1) as part of the overall framework.

In the focus groups, interpersonal literacy was consistently identified as most important to the successful integration of sustainability attitudes and actions. Many focus group participants described the ability to communicate with others as the most important way to move sustainability forward at Penn State; this would be particularly true of efforts to increase support for and implementation of the competencies framework. From their viewpoint, the potential impact of their sustainability-related work would not be achieved without effectively communicating about it with others.

Many participants described the importance of interpersonal literacy as it relates to other metacompetencies. For example, one participant pointed out that good communication skills are not sufficient on their own—to be

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competent in sustainability, one must be able to communicate from an ethical perspective. One such discussion might be the the ethical implications for different parties of pursuing—or not pursuing—particular sustainable operations at Penn State. Other participants stressed the connection between interpersonal literacy and creativity, because communication about sustainability especially in environments that are negative or apathetic towards sustainability efforts, requires new and energetic ways of conveying the meaning and importance of sustainability.

The overall reaction to the framework was positive, and the participants were particularly supportive of the notion of competencies as guidelines. Implementation was discussed at three different scales: implementation into the participants’ own work, implementation into their home unit, and implementation university-wide. Most participants remarked positively on the relevancy of the framework to their own work. Some pointed out that they have already integrated sustainability into their own tasks; for them, the competencies could provide a framework for discussing what they are already doing, but would not necessarily foster additional sustainable behavior. Some faculty members remarked that it would be possible to use the framework to further develop and evaluate their curriculum.

As for the unit- and university-level implementation, while stating their support for this broader approach, some participants indicated that a mandate from the administration might have the opposite of the intended result; they felt that their colleagues would be resistant to new policies or expectations that seemed to be “shoved down their throats.” While they did want to see leadership on this issue from the highest administrative levels, they also wanted recognition for what they have already been doing. In addition, some participants noted their own sector’s unique contribution to sustainability, as well as areas for improvement in this realm. Other participants mentioned that they often struggle to elicit support for sustainability efforts within their own units; they describe themselves as individual champions within units where their colleagues are generally apathetic about sustainability-related initiatives. They described this work environment as a potential challenge for the implementation of the framework within their units and at the university in general; if sustainability remains the work of individuals or units that are known champions, then the competencies framework may never garner the support needed to be an effective tool.

Although there were many suggestions about job-specific competencies that could be incorporated into the general model of sustainability competencies (see Table 2), it became clear that the work of applying this model to individual jobs across campus would be a long-term undertaking. In part this is because of the vast number of jobs and tasks at the University, and in part it is because of the limited support for sustainability at the individual, unit,

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and administrative levels of the University. One participant, however, suggested that the competency framework, as it develops, may offer the language needed to pursue greater support for sustainability at Penn State, as it may help individuals and units to better see the connections between their work and the sustainability mission of the University.

Table 2. Examples of meta-competencies applications in faculty and staff tasks

TaskSystems Thinking

Temporal Thinking

Ethical Literacy

Interpersonal Literacy

Creativity

Purchasing

Evaluation of entire supply chain of purchased item (cradle-to-cradle)

Longevity of item; consequences of its disposal and disposal of its packaging

Environmental and social conditions of production of the item

If a different item is deemed to be more responsible choice, work with those who will use the item to get buy-in on the alternative

Is the item necessary? What else could be done?

Music History Class

Assignment

Types

Role of music in cultures—who participates and how and why

Which music lives on through time; what sustains it and does it sustain people? Why?

How can/does music play a role in depicting important (sustainability) issues of our time or other times?

Could you invite broader community participation in music programs—how might this affect the sustainability of the community? How might musicians play a role in conveying importance of sustainable behaviors?

How can music itself be used to help change behavior or policy related to sustainability?

Lawn CareWhat organisms go into a flourishing lawn? How are they related to one another? What affects these relationships and what/who is affected by them?

What were the reasons for having this particular kind of lawn in this particular place? Does it still make sense? Would a change have more positive long-term impacts?

Who benefits from this lawn, and are there negative effects of maintaining this lawn? Are there reasons to have native species or food production instead of lawn in this location?

Talk with supervisor and co-workers about sustainability concerns regarding lawn care.

What is the space/the lawn used for now? What might it be used for? What do people need here and is it possible to get it?

Holding a university-

wide meeting about

Knowledge of all the stakeholders in the

Understand short- and long-term implications of

Weigh the value of a face-to-face meeting that

Work with all potential participants to determine

Develop new ways to foster community without having

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changes to a

particular academic program

program and their roles (faculty, staff, students, administrators, alumni, accrediting bodies, etc.)

holding meeting in a number of different manners—does it imply that meetings must always have this impact (good or bad)

can help improve sense of community, and possibly increase mutual understanding, against value of remote meeting with less environmental impact (and opportunity for education about impact, and good feelings because of that).

whether travel can be limited—and people can share more rides

high environmental impact.Imagine different kinds of meetings, including several smaller regional ones, etc.

VII. Applications of the Framework

Curricular and Co-curricular Initiatives

The competencies framework will be introduced to the faculty through active (workshops, roundtables, etc.) as well as more passive (web-based information, white paper, etc.) means. Initial explanation of the competencies in a forum that allows for question-and-answer sessions is expected to be most effective. After taking some time to introduce these concepts to a core group of sustainability champions among the faculty, and to some degree to the faculty as a whole, we will work with those who are committed to sustainability issues to document examples of assignments, activities and course structures that are designed to help students develop their core competencies in sustainability.

The core competencies will be used as the basis for a revised sustainability course survey. The survey will first be issued to faculty members who have identified their courses as sustainability-focused or sustainability-related. This group will be asked to consider how their stated course outcomes might be revised to include specific references to sustainability meta-competencies. The survey will have three principle outcomes:

1. It will provide an opportunity for reflection and discussion about the nature of the knowledge that students have when they leave our classes and when they leave the university. The language of competencies can bring a new dimension to the way faculty members view their roles as class instructors. The degree to which this may be transformative is, of course, variable; many faculty members already consider the impact of their courses on the attitudes, behaviors and actions of students (and graduates) in their personal, professional and

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civic lives. Others may feel constrained by the requirements for the professional accreditation to which their students aspire; those faculty members who tend to focus primarily on the content needed for such credentials may still find that discussing competencies opens the door to new ways of covering required content while at the same time developing sustainability competencies.

2. As faculty members respond to the survey, we will continue to develop the database of courses that address sustainability, this time with the meta-competencies as the focus. By comparing courses to one another, faculty members have the opportunity to learn who is teaching sustainability concepts and competencies. This, along with workshops and other faculty events, will help to expand and deepen the community of sustainability pedagogy practitioners across the University. As the course database grows, students and academic advisors will be able to see how different courses address sustainability competencies, and to ensure that they work on all competencies while pursuing their undergraduate degrees (and in particular the Sustainability Leadership minor).

3. Faculty members who complete the survey will be asked to contribute their exemplary lessons and class activities to the Field Guide for Teaching Sustainability at Penn State. While the courses listed in the Field Guide already refer to sustainability and leadership competencies as discussed in the context of the Sustainability Leadership minor, the addition of the meta-competency outcomes will help connect faculty efforts with the efforts of other units within the University.

In addition to reaching students through the curriculum, there are opportunities to develop sustainability competencies through student organizations. With sufficient understanding of the key competencies in sustainability, students in sustainability-related organizations can plan co-curricular work with the intention of further developing these competencies among their membership. Initial efforts may be made via the Student Sustainability Advisory Council and the Council of Sustainable Leaders, as well as through individual student leaders who are able to reach a large number of interested students.

Workforce Development

To foster an understanding of sustainability and its applications among University employees, the Sustainability Institute and the Office of Human Resources will further develop their efforts to integrate sustainability competencies and concepts into existing online and in-person training modules. The competencies framework will be useful in guiding this effort, as

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well as in creating performance evaluation assessments, position descriptions and professional development goals. Already the key competencies have been used in training programs. For example, a housing director used them to create training programs for student peer educators; he stated that the competencies offered him insights into the broad dimensions of sustainability thinking. Green Teams newsletters regularly include sustainability content that illustrates systems and temporal thinking competencies; this type of information is also found in Green Team training for these peer-to-peer educators. Going forward, there are plans to address ethical perspectives through these materials and programs, and to find ways to build interpersonal skills and creativity competencies.

VIII. Discussion and Next Steps

The work that we have completed to date has given us a framework for core sustainability competencies. Our literature review, benchmarking, and discussions with sustainability experts have reinforced the competencies approach to the work of incorporating sustainability across Penn State University. The notion of a competency approach has been well received and the framework concept seems to be broadly accessible, making it an important resource in developing a common language around sustainability across the University. This common language is the foundation for sustainable decision-making and behavior. And while the framework is not considered definitive at this point, it is ready for further critique and refinement; this continuation of the iterative process will make the competencies framework a tool that is broadly understood and utilized.

As previously discussed, our final framework integrates five meta-competencies for sustainability: systems thinking, temporal thinking, interpersonal literacy, ethical literacy, and creativity. The literature review provided wide-ranging support for the core sustainability meta-competencies; interviews and focus groups refined and expanded the framework. In discussing sustainability and its related competencies with people from diverse professional and personal backgrounds, we began to see the range of interpretations and applications of these competencies; this observed variability suggests that a common language is needed to help guide multidisciplinary and cross-unit work in sustainability.

The inclusion of creativity as a meta-competency is one of the significant contributions of this work. Several of the key informants focused on the importance of fostering an inquisitive nature and of thinking differently. This fifth competency also resonated with focus group participants in a way that encouraged us to keep it as a part of the final proposed framework. Although it is possible to view this competency (and its sub-competencies and associated tasks) as a subset of other competencies or frameworks, our

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current model reflects the importance that our participants afforded creativity.

The results of our fieldwork left no doubt that a competency approach is more complicated than simply creating ‘merit-badges’ or ‘check-boxes’ for sustainability, as discussed previously. Competencies for sustainability must be thoroughly integrated into the many functions of the University, with commitment from all levels of the University hierarchy. The overall assessment of the meta-competencies framework was positive, though it was tempered by skepticism about whether the competencies could be embraced by all members of the University community.

Limitations

As was understood from the beginning of the project, the limitations of this work have an effect on the generalizability of the results. The proposed framework is largely based on previous research, and the number of participants responding to it is not large. As a basis for ongoing research, however, the framework stands at just one of many milestones that we anticipate reaching; interviews with experts will be continued at every opportunity; responses from various community members will be recorded at each stage of implementation; focus groups and larger town hall meetings will provide venues for input that will help us to refine the model and the implementation strategy.

The key informant and focus group populations were not large enough to make distinctions between different reference groups (e.g., staff vs. faculty), but this could be an enlightening point of focus for future. The participants were all sustainability champions, a necessity of this first phase, in which knowledge of sustainability issues was expected of those giving feedback. Future phases will include the opinions of those who don’t work in the realm of sustainability or self-identify as sustainability champions; this will be crucial in identifying the changes that are unlikely to occur to sustainability experts.

The sample also lacked high-level administrators—those people who are ultimately needed to provide support for policy and other top-down measures that will complement the bottom-up approaches.

Lastly, it became apparent that discussions of competencies require extensive explication and interpretation; the idea of competencies is abstract, and while it can generate rich conversation and reflection, it can also lead to confusion and misinterpretation. Sufficient time, therefore, is needed in both key informant interviews and focus groups (and in future town halls and workshops) to explain what a competencies framework

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actually is, and it is important to allow for this clarification while providing enough time to discuss the intricacies and value of the framework itself.

Next StepsIn order to make this a useful tool for faculty, staff, administrators and students, we need to demonstrate its applicability and flexibility across applications. This demonstration will come through pilot implementation, through further interviews, focus groups and workshops, and through collaboration with faculty, staff, students, administrators and human resources professionals. Future work includes:

Additional focus groups with targeted participant makeup. This will allow us to elaborate on the uses of the framework for specific jobs.

Additional interviews with key informants. These individuals will help us to determine applicability of the framework to specific academic disciplines and job categories.

Work with human resources personnel to identify ways to define jobs, develop training, and evaluate job performance using the framework.This work must be conducted with an attitude of openness and receptiveness to different approaches to sustainability. The competencies framework has been designed as an inclusive and iterative approach to understanding and applying sustainability; it is intended to allow individuals to find their own place in the work of sustainability.

Work with the Rock Ethics Institute. Given the parallels and intersections of the work of the Sustainability Institute and the work of incorporating ethics across the University, we will continue to hold conversations and look for opportunities for collaborations with our colleagues at the Rock Ethics Institute.

Work with the Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence to develop strategies and programs for working with faculty across University.

Work with the Sustainability Leadership Minor Faculty Program Committee to incorporate competencies language relating to the Intercollege Minor in Sustainability Leadership.

Work with Green Teams and Green Paws participants to make the language of competencies part of their sustainability work, to create training for other employees, and to collect more feedback on how employees are responding to these competency frameworks.

Develop methods to assess the competencies across multiple applications: student, faculty, and staff development, community outreach, etc.

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VIII. References

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Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. 2015. “AASHE Academic Programs Database.” http://www.aashe.org/resources/ academic-programs/. Accessed June 2015.

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Barth, M., J. Godemann, M. Rieckmann, & U. Stoltenburg. 2007. “Development key competencies for sustainable development in higher education.” International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education 8(4):416-430.

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Chatham University. 2015. “Master of Sustainability Program Student Learning Outcomes.” Chatham University. Pittsburgh, PA. (http://falk.chatham.edu/msus/outcomes.cfm.)

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Creswell, J.W. 2012. Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

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Davies, G.R. 2013. “Appraising Weak and Strong Sustainability: Searching for a Middle Ground.” Consilience: The Journal of Sustainable Development 10 (1):111 – 124. Davies, J. 2014. “Sustainbility and Employee Engagement, The State of the Art.” Davis, P., Naughton, J., and Rothwell, W. 2004. “New Roles and New Competencies for the Professional.” T+D, 58(4):26-36.

de Haan, G. 2010. “The development of ESD-related competencies in supportive institutional frameworks.” International Review of Education 56(2-3):315-328.

Ehrenfeld, J. (2008). Sustainability by design: A subversive strategy for transforming our consumer culture. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Elkington, J. 1994. Towards the sustainable corporation: Win-win-win business strategies for sustainable development. California Management Review 36(2):90-100.Faruk, A. and A. Hoffmann. 2012. “Sustainability and Leadership Competencies for Business Leaders.” Business for Social Responsibility Report. (http://www.bsr.org/reports/BSR_Sustainability_Leadership_ Competencies.pdf).

Frisk, E. and K.L. Larson. 2011. “Educating for Sustainability: Competencies & Practices for Transformative Action.” Journal of Sustainability Education 2.

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Habron, G. 2012. “Competency-based sustainability specialization at Michigan State University.” Sustainability: The Journal of Record 5(6):379-385.

Heinburg, R. 2010. “What is Sustainability?” The Post Carbon Reader Series: Foundation Concepts. Santa Rosa, CA. (http://assets-production-webvanta-com.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/000000/03/97/ original/Reader/PCReader-Heinberg-Foundation.pdf).

Jucker, R. 2002. “’Sustainability? Never heard of it!’” Some basics we shouldn't ignore when engaging in education for sustainability.” International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education 3(1):8-18.

Mathews, D. 2014. “The Ecology of Democracy: Finding Ways to Have a Stronger Hand in Shaping our Future.” A Kettering Foundation publication. (https://www.kettering.org/catalog/product/ecology-democracy)

McNall, S.G. and G. Basile. 2013. “How to Create a New Narrative for Sustainability That Will Work: And Why It Matters.” Sustainability 6(6):297-301.

Mulkey, S. 2012. “Sustainability Science as a Foundation for Higher Education in the Environmental Century.” Sustainability 5(6):356-358.

Natural Step. 2015. “Our Approach.” (http://www.thenaturalstep.org/our-approach/.)

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PSU Sustainability Institute. 2014. “SI Strategic Plan.” (http://sustainability.psu.edu/sustainability-institutes-strategic-plan-0)

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Savitz, A.W. and K. Weber. 2013. Talent, Transformation, and the Triple Bottom Line: How Companies Can Leverage Human Resources to Achieve Sustainable Growth. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

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IX. Appendices – Tables of Contents

Tables/Frameworks from lit reviewA. Frisk & Larson 2011B. Wiek et al. 2011

Protocols from Field WorkC. Interview ProtocolD. Focus Group Protocol

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APPENDIX A Summary of Key Competencies and Approaches for Sustainability Education (Table 2, Frisk & Larson 2011)

Sustainability Competencies: Educational Pedagogy1. Systems thinking and an understanding of interconnectedness

Concepts: Interconnections among the

environment, economy, and society, including impacts, trade-offs, feedbacks, and unintended consequences of individual and collective actions

Methods: Real-world case studies with

place-based lessons and activities

Interdisciplinary approaches to problem-based learning

Avoid ‘assembly-line’ fragmentation of subjects and oversimplification of issues as simply right/wrong or true/false

2. Long-term, foresighted thinking

Concepts: Future orientation in terms of

achieving inter-generational equity, in minimizing the long-term impacts of human actions, realizing societal visions of the future and developing transition strategies and evaluative techniques

Methods: Visioning exercises Forecasting & backcasting

activities Avoid ‘one-size fits all’

solutions in visioning activities3. Stakeholder engagement and group collaboration

Concepts: Democratic decision making,

including intra-generational equity in participation and consideration of plural perspectives and transdisciplinary collaborations

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Methods: Community-based service

learning Role-playing activities such as

mock citizen jury or conflict resolution

Group projects and collaborative activities

Avoid evaluating students solely based on individual activities and outcomes

4. Action-orientation and change-agent skills

Concepts: Transformational consumer

actions, along with civic and community engagement

Methods: Experiential lessons including

project-based learning, community service-learning, and place-based activities

Commitment pledges Avoid informational learning

solely based on declarative knowledge

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APPENDIX B

Overview of core concepts and methods/methodologies of the five key competencies in sustainability (Adapted from Wiek et al. 2011: 213) Competency Similar Terms Concepts Methods/

MethodologiesSystems-thinking competence

System thinking, interconnected thinking, holistic thinking

Variables/indicators, sub-systems, structures, functions

Feedback loops, complex cause-effect chains, cascading effects, inertia, tipping points, legacy, resilience, adaptation, structuration

Across/multiple scales: local to global

Across/multiple/coupled domains: society, environment, economy, technology

People and social systems: values, preferences, needs, perceptions, (collective) actions, decisions, power, tactics, politics, institutions

Qualitative and quantitative modeling

Institutional, decision, governance, social systems analysis

Systems multi-methodologies (e.g., ‘‘thick’’ description methodology)

Participatory systems approaches, including participatory modeling

Anticipatory competence

Anticipatory thinking, future thinking, foresighted thinking, trans-generational thinking

Concepts of time including temporal phases (past, present, future), terms (short, long), states, continuity (dynamics, paths), non-linearity

Concept of uncertainty and epistemic status including possibility, probability, desirability of future developments (predictions, scenarios, visions)

Concepts of inertia, path dependency, non-interventions

Concepts of consistency and plausibility of future developments

Concepts of risk, intergenerational equity, precaution

Scenario methodology

Forecasting from statistical and simulation models

Backcasting and envisioning methods

Anticipatory multi-methodologies

Participatory anticipatory approaches, including Delphi and future workshop

Normative competence

Values-focused thinking,

(Un-)sustainability of current or future states

Multi-criteria assessment

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orientation thinking/knowledge, ethical thinking

Sustainability principles, goals, targets, thresholds (tipping points)

Concepts of justice, fairness, responsibility, safety, happiness, etc.

Concept of risk, harm, damage

Concept of reinforcing gains (‘‘win–win’’) and tradeoffs

Ethical concepts

methods (including Life-Cycle Assessment, Multi-Attribute Utility Theory, etc.)

Risk analysis Sustainability

efficiency analysis Envisioning

methods (e.g., backcasting)

Participatory normative methods, including negotiation methods and consensus conference

Strategic competence

Action-oriented competence, transformative competence, implementation skills

Intentionality Transitions and

transformation Strategies, action

programs, (systemic) intervention, transformative governance

Success factors, viability, feasibility, effectiveness, efficiency

Adaptation and mitigation

Obstacles (resistance, reluctance, path dependency, habits) and synergies

Instrumentalization and alliances

Social learning Social movements

Methods to design governance arrangements, policies, institutions

Planning methodologies

Decision support methodologies

Transition management methodology

Methods to support behavioral change

Organizational (change) management

Methods to support learning and reflexivity

Interpersonal competence

Collaborative, participatory, interdisciplinary, civic competence

Functions, types, and dynamics of collaboration (within and beyond academia)

Strengths, weaknesses, success, and failure in teams

Concepts of leadership Limits of cooperation

and empathy Concepts of solidarity

and ethnocentrism

Participatory methods, including negotiation, mediation, deliberation, constructive conflict methodology

Teamwork methods

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APPENDIX 3 – Competencies Key Informant Interview Protocol

This is a series of open-ended questions designed to get the interviewees thoughts on sustainability competencies.  They should be recorded and transcribed.

We have asked you to give us some of your insights about sustainability and its importance in the work of your unit.

Optional preface, depending on interviewee:Ask about how they view the concept of sustainabilityRemind them of PSU’s definition of sustainabilityDescribe what we mean by “competency”

What would you consider to be “competencies” in sustainability?This may lead to discussion of competencies – keep that brief if possible, and address more fully at end of interview if appropriate

Which ones are most necessary to success in your own job and/or your own unit?(What are necessary sustainability competencies for doing the job

sustainably)And why?  Explain their importanceHow are they (the competencies) related to each other?

How do you put these competencies into practice?-in your job?-at home?

  -in your daily life?-as part of your civic responsibility

For each occupation there will be a specific, more detailed set of competenciesWhat do you, or what does your unit, have to uniquely contribute to a

sustainable future?

How would you want to use defined sustainability competencies in (hiring/training/creating coursework and educational materials; assessing job performance) – exact nature of this question depends on interviewee

How do you deal with your frustration when these competencies are not in evidence?

How hopeful are you about these issues?

May occasionally remind of PSU’s definition of sustainability, if focus becomes too narrow

As wrap-up, ask how they think about “competencies” and what they mean by that term

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APPENDIX 4 – Focus Group Questionnaire and Protocol

5 min Focus Group Info Ask permission to record See script from IRB application

10 min Introductions Name/Unit/Job How do you incorporate sustainability into your daily, civic,

or work life?

10 min Review why we are doing this and what we mean by competencies

Timeline of project Competencies framework

15 min Brainstorm on additions/refinements to structure. Reactions? What do you think of these? What is missing? What else should be up there?

20 min How do these fit into your job? How do they affect your work? Job responsibilities – which are most important? Ranking activity

15 min How do we measure these? Measurable units? Metrics? How might you measure the most important of these?

Second most important of these? Etc.

10 min Could you use these competencies in your unit? Staff meeting, faculty meeting, work unit? Would it fit into regular training you do? Job descriptions? Job searches? Interviews? Strategic planning?

5 min Closing Thank you’s Next steps Final questions Encourage participants to share

thoughts/comments/questions via email afterwards

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