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The purpose of this paper is to explore the labor market position of environmental science graduates and the core competencies of these environmental professionals related to their working practice.

The authors carried out two surveys amongst alumni of the integrated environmental science program of Utrecht University and their employers. The surveys addressed alumni's working experiences and employers' assessment of the core competencies of environmental science graduates.

The surveys indicated that environmental science graduates have a fairly strong position on the labor market. They are employed in a diverse range of functions and working sectors, including consultancy agencies, research institutions, governmental organizations and NGOs. Graduates as well as employers consider a number of generic academic skills (e.g. intellectual qualities, communication skills) as well as discipline specific professional knowledge and practical skills as important competencies for the working practice of environmental scientists.

These insights can be used for the improvement of environmental science curricula in order to increase the employability of their graduates.

This paper presents data on the labor market position of graduates of “integrated” environmental science programs and provides insights into the core competencies of these graduates.

Conducts an analysis of the content and scope of textbooks in environmental science, and discusses what to do about possible shortcomings. In almost all introductory courses, teachers and students make use of textbooks. One may therefore safely assume that the content of these books reflects somehow what is thought to be relevant to the teaching and knowledge of environmental sciences. Scope and content may therefore represent what is considered to be the core curriculum, at least in the eyes of the editors and writers of these books. The analysis is confined to 12 textbooks published over the last five years, of which ten are in the English language, paying most attention to those widely used. Important research questions were: What perspective do the books take? Is their scope clearly depicted? How are environmental problems defined? What are the major issues and concepts dealt with? How are they structured? What is left out and/or missed? None of the books examined takes a disciplinary stance. In nearly all, chooses a thematic approach, with strong emphasis on Earth as a living system, and on the human‐environment interrelationship. There is a rather strong overlap in themes and concepts used, suggesting the existence of a shared “body of knowledge”, which is quite promising when striving after a core curriculum. Social and societal aspects come relatively late on the stage, mostly in the second or third part of the books, when implementation of measures is at stake. In several textbooks, environmental problems are taken as problems formulated and defined by natural scientists. Interdisciplinary methodology does not get proper attention.

This paper responds to recent calls for deeper scrutiny of the institutional contexts of citizen science. In the last few years, at least two dozen civil society organizations in New York and Pennsylvania have begun monitoring the watershed impacts of unconventional natural gas drilling, also known as “fracking.” This study examines the institutional logics that inform these citizen monitoring efforts and probes how relationships with academic science and the regulatory state affect the practices of citizen scientists. We find that the diverse practices of the organizations in the participatory water monitoring field are guided by logics of consciousness-raising, environmental policing, and science. Organizations that initiate monitoring projects typically attempt to combine two or more of these logics as they develop new practices in response to macro-level social and environmental changes. The dominant logic of the field remains unsettled, and many groups appear uncertain about whether and how their practices might have an influence. We conclude that the impacts of macro-level changes, such as the scientization of politics, the rise of neoliberal policy ideas, or even large-scale industrial transformations, are likely to be experienced in field-specific ways.

With the proliferation of environmental science literature during the past two decades, librarians find it increasingly difficult to determine which sources of information are relevant to their clientele. This difficulty is compounded for the non‐science librarian by a lack of familiarity with journals currently available and the decidedly technical language of most environmental science publications. There are, however, a wide range of periodicals which are appropriate for informed readers at academic university libraries and public libraries that offer a wealth of information on the environmental sciences. It is this type of publication that will be identified in this annotated bibliography. As with all selected bibliographies, it does not attempt to identify all environmental science journal titles that may be used in an academic university library or public library. Titles selected will be those thought to be appropriate for the informed reader.

Purpose – The lack of diversity in environmental institutions has been a concern of environmental justice activists and scholars for several decades now. Although studies have been conducted on the level of diversity in environmental groups, environmental organizations, and student participation in environmental programs, little research has been conducted on faculty diversity in environmental departments. This chapter examines the status of minority faculty in university environmental programs in the United States.

Design/methodology/approach – The chapter examines results from a national survey of 2,407 faculty in several environmental disciplines.

Findings – The results were consistent with national studies of science and engineering (S&E) faculty that find that Hispanics, blacks, and Native Americans are underrepresented among the faculty in these units. The analysis also points to the fact that female faculty are underrepresented and are in a more vulnerable position than male faculty.

Originality/value – The examination of race and gender indicates that scholars should pay more attention to the interaction effects of these variables to identify the different levels of vulnerability that female faculty in these disciplines face.

Environmental education at technical schools and at universities has distinctive features, the profiles of which are tailored according to the teaching models of engineers and academics respectively. In this paper we suggest that the exchange of teachers and teaching methods between polytechnics and universities can be profitable for both parties. For engineers it should bring a broader perspective and more global understanding of environmental systems, while for university graduates it should help them to understand better the practical problems and limits of technical solutions. The forms of exchange and their potential benefits are still not explored sufficiently. Examples of some relatively modest forms of collaboration in environmental education between the Polytechnic of Lausanne and the University of Geneva are given to show that more vigorous exchange would facilitate mutual understanding of graduates in their future environmental careers. Better mutual understanding between engineers and natural scientists clearly will increase the societal relevance of environmental education and increase the efficiency of interdisciplinary teams.

Ongoing environmental threats have intensified the need for firms to take big leaps forward to operate in a manner that is both ecologically sustainable and socially responsible. This paper aims to assess the degree to which firms are adopting citizen science as a tool to achieve sustainability and social responsibility targets.

This study applies a qualitative content analysis approach to assess the current presence of citizen science in sustainability and social responsibility reports issued by Globescan sustainability leaders and by firms ranked by the Fortune 500 and Fortune Global 500.

While the term itself is mostly absent from reports, firms are reporting on a range of activities that could be classified as a form of “citizen science.”

Citizen science can help firms achieve their corporate sustainability and corporate social responsibility goals and targets. Linking sustainability and social responsibility efforts to this existing framework can help triangulate corporate efforts to engage with stakeholders, collect data about the state of the environment and promote better stewardship of natural resources.

Supporting citizen science can help firms work toward meeting UN Sustainable Development Goals, which have highlighted the importance of collaborative efforts that can engage a broad range of stakeholders in the transition to more sustainable business models.

This paper is the first to examine citizen science in a corporate sustainability and social responsibility context. The findings present information to support improvements to the development of locally relevant science-based indicators; real-time monitoring of natural resources and supply chain sustainability; and participatory forums for stakeholders including suppliers, end users and the broader community.

The aim of this paper is to outline the collaborative approach used to craft national learning standards for tertiary programs in the field of environment and sustainability in Australia. The field of environment and sustainability is broad and constituted by diverse stakeholders. As such, articulating a common set of learning standards presents challenges.

The authors developed and used a staged collaborative curriculum design methodology to engage more than 250 stakeholders in tertiary environmental education, including discipline scholars, students, professional associations and employers and other environmental educators. The approach was adaptive, to ensure underrepresented stakeholders’ perspectives were welcomed and recognised. The project was commissioned by the Australian Council of Environmental Deans and Directors (ACEDD) and funded by the Federal Government’s Office for Learning and Teaching.

The collaborative approach developed and used for this work facilitated an inclusive process that valued diversity of perspectives, rather than marginalise diversity in favour of a perspective representing a minimum level of agreement. This is reflected in the standards themselves, and is evidenced by participant feedback, piloting of the standards and their subsequent application at multiple universities. Achieving this required careful planning and facilitation, to ensure a democratisation of the stakeholder consultation process, and to build consensus in support of the standards. Endorsement by ACEDD formalised the standards’ status.

Collaborative curriculum design offered the opportunity to foster a shared sense of common purpose amongst diverse environmental education stakeholders. This approach to curriculum design is intensive and generative but uncommon and may be usefully adapted and applied in other contexts. The authors note one subsequent instance where the approach has been further developed and applied in transforming a generalist science program, suggesting the methodology used in this case may be applied across other contexts, albeit with appropriate adjustments: the authors offer it here in the spirit of supporting others in their own complex curriculum design challenges.

This study is the first of a five‐phase research project sponsored by the Council of Environmental Deans and Directors (CEDD), an organization of environmental program managers operating under the umbrella of the National Council for Science and the Environment. The purpose of the project is to determine if a consensus on core competencies for environmental program graduates is achievable, and if so, to make recommendations for consideration by program managers.

Q methodology was used to discern the perspectives of program managers at 42 CEDD member institutions on environmental curriculum design. An online survey preceded the Q sort exercise to elicit managers' curricular views and program characteristics. Survey responses were analyzed to select statements for the Q‐sorting exercise and categorized according to emergent themes. Multiple regression analysis was used to explore the relationship between perspectives (factor loadings) and host institution Carnegie classifications.

Three distinct, but not opposing, perspectives were identified from the initial Q‐factor rotation, which suggests the possibility of agreement on core competencies. The perspectives differ in their views of: curriculum orientation (professional training versus liberal arts), curriculum breadth versus depth, and flexible versus fixed core competencies. Host institution classification (Carnegie) is a small but significant predictor for two of the three perspectives. A second Q‐factor rotation reveals a consensus perspective that accommodates most respondents and aligns well with principles of sustainability, thus suggesting that sustainability may serve as a guiding paradigm for defining areas of core competence.

No national study of program managers' views of curriculum design and the identification of core competencies has been conducted in the USA.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the presence of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) proposed by the UN (2015) in university degrees within the fields of education, humanities and environmental sciences (ES) at Andalusian public institutions (Spain).

This paper shows an empirical analysis from a mixed methodological model on a total of 99 syllabi and training programs from nine different universities. The collection of information has been carried out through a rubric specifically designed within the framework of this body of research.

The results show that the syllabus of the subjects in the faculties of education includes the SDGs related to the social aspect of sustainability, with special focus on SDG4, SDG5, SDG10, SDG16 and SDG17, whereas others like SDG6 and SDG7 are less represented. SDGs are present in the majority of syllabus of the subjects analysed. It is certainly a positive finding which shows predisposition and a high interest on by the teachers involved. However, this is not enough as there is still a long way to go until achieving a thorough and complete incorporation of the principles of sustainability.

This research sheds light on the changes and transformations that the discourse linked to sustainability is generating in the university syllabi. Taking the SDG as a framework this paper highlights the most original aspects: a replicable methodology that allows diagnosing the level of curricular greening of the university syllabi is provided to other contexts the innovative value of connecting teaching with local and global environmental problems in their physical-chemical social and economic dimensions is shown and it has been possible to compare the difficulties of some universities in addressing compliance with the SDGs and curricular sustainability from a systemic and integrative perspective that will lead to methodological transformation and pedagogical renewal.