OCAD University
IN-38: Sustainability Course Designation

The OCAD U Sustainability Committee worked with program Chairs to identify undergraduate and graduate course offerings that provide students with the knowledge and skills to help understand and/or address sustainability challenges. We compiled a course inventory with an aim to make this list available to students to help inform their course registration decisions. The OCAD U course catalogue now includes a 'sustainability' filter option under 'course type' within the advanced search option. 

This project supports the Academic Plan 2017-2022 goal to “Systematically assess how sustainability is currently addressed within the curriculum and recommend a plan to enhance and further integrate this priority into the curriculum” (p.25) and the current 2022-2028 Academic & Strategic Plan objective to “Embed sustainability learning outcomes in over 80 per cent of curriculum by 2028” (p.15). 

To define sustainability, the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals are used to frame these discussions, as referenced in the Academic Plan and the OCAD U Sustainability Policy.
The aim is to bolster a comprehensive approach to sustainability at the program level and the degree level that incorporates diverse approaches to sustainability, and to support students to develop a broad understanding of the major socioeconomic and ecological issues facing current and future generations.

Course inventory methodology:
Step 1: The Advisor, Strategic Sustainability worked with the Associate Registrar to develop a broad list of possible courses whose course title and/or course description contained a keyword from a list based on recommended keywords by STARS (the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System used by 70+ Canadian universities and colleges).

Step 2: The STARS methodology identifies two major course types:
i) Sustainability-focused courses: The course title or description indicates a primary and explicit focus on sustainability.
ii) Sustainability- related courses: The course description or rationale provided in the course inventory indicates that the course incorporates a unit or module on sustainability or a sustainability challenge, includes one or more sustainability-focused activities, or integrates sustainability challenges, issues, and concepts throughout the course.

The Advisor then narrowed down the initial course list by reading through all course data entries to eliminate any courses that had no relationship to sustainability or major sustainability issues. From the remaining list, courses were categorized as either “sustainability-focused” or “sustainability-related”.

Step 3: At the undergraduate level, finalized course inventory was shared back to Program Chairs in a one-on-one meeting with the Advisor for review and revision where appropriate. At the graduate level, the Graduate Program Directors provided feedback towards the finalized course inventory.