RSS
http://www.flickr.com/photos/genevievelepine/2456421393/
The news from the climate front is not good. Experts on sea level rise write How High Will Seas Rise? Get Ready for Seven Feet. The National Science Foundation notes that Methane Releases From Arctic Shelf May Be Much Larger and Faster Than Anticipated. A UNEP report predicts 6.3F temperature rise by end of century even if we adopt and live up to all the legislation on the table to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Which we’re not.
There are clearly many reasons why the general public is confused about climate and not feeling a sense of urgency about preparing for changes that are already well underway. But in higher education, where over 670 college and university Presidents or Chancellors have signed the Presidents’ Climate Commitment and we should know better, it often feels like we’re not only rearranging the deck chairs on a sinking ship, but, in the sustainability corner of the schools, we argue about what shade of green to paint the chairs.
Here’s a modest suggestion: Let’s replace the term “sustainability” in our vocabulary with “survivability.” The later term makes it clear right up front what the stakes are: survival itself. (Not that we can’t “survive and thrive.”)
The former term has for many years meant everything to many people and nothing to many more. More than a decade ago when we started the Boulder Area Sustainability Information Network, we wondered whether the “s” word really meant anything meaningful. We decided that even if it didn’t, we’d use it anyway since it was a popular buzzword in some circles back then.
Similar logic must have gone into Halliburton moving to embrace “a sustainabile future” early in the Gulf War. Since then other companies have jumped on the sustainability bandwagon, including Wal-Mart, which is supporting the Sustainability Consortium which is working on developing an index to help make carbon footprints, along with water, toxics, social impacts that are embedded in products more transparent.
(This is a great idea and is potentially revolutionary, but so far the effort has been very closed and without broad involvement of other partners, it will continue to perceived as the “Wal-Mart Sustainability Index” meant to primarily benefit the world’s largest retailer.)
In higher education, the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) has led efforts to green college operations and curriculum. I recently attended an AASHE national sustainability curriculum meeting that Second Nature, which manages the Presidents’ Climate Commitment, funded. Early on we put the word “sustainability” on the shelf since we could easily have spent days trying to define the term.
At dinner at the end of the first day, chatting with the Provost of a large upper Mid-West University, we agreed that the problem with the word “sustainability” is that it can leave the impression that we want to “sustain” and perpetuate the status quo. It’s far too wishy-washy. Change out a few light blubs, form a few task force to study how to green the curriculum, make buildings LEEDS certified and call it good. Oh, and maybe, if we can, offer students a few courses in sustainablity. Or open up a center across campus where they do sustainability so we can check that box.
Hunter Lovins (who uses “painting the deck chairs green” analogy often) has it right: climate literacy is an imperative for survival. It should be at the center of all our curriculum. Not watered down as “sustainability studies.”
Even if sea level rise is a fraction of what the experts predict, even if temperatures are only half of what seems to be in the pipeline, even if we haven’t yet crossed a tipping point releasing methane and further amplifying the warming, we need to prepare this generation and those to follow to minimize the impacts and maximize our preparedness.
Like just before 9/11 when the lights were all blinking red, a few folks, (probably dismissed then as “alarmists”,) are running around with their hair on fire while the rest of the establishment/status quo fail to respond to the urgency the situation demands.
