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Universities strategically organize themselves around sustainability, including transformative goals in teaching and learning. Simultaneously, the role of online education has become more prominent. This study aims to better understand the purpose and process of creating online sustainability education (OSE) and to identify challenges and opportunities for implementing these courses and programs to achieve universities’ broader transformative sustainability goals.

This study uses a multiple case study design to research three universities in diverse geographical and institutional contexts (Finland, the USA and Colombia). Qualitative data was collected by interviewing program-related experts (n = 31) and reviews of universities’ strategic documents.

The findings suggest that despite important advances, further attention is merited regarding aligning the purpose of OSE with student learning outcomes, clarifying the values underlying the process of online program/course creation and developing transformative and process-oriented approaches and pedagogies to implement OSE. The authors also highlight emerging challenges and opportunities in online environments for sustainability education in different institutional contexts, including reaping the benefits of multilocality and diverse student experiences regarding sustainability issues.

There is a paucity of studies on university-level sustainability education in relation to online environments. This research expands on the existing literature by exploring three different geographical and institutional contexts and shedding light on the relationship between the practical implementation of OSE and universities’ broader sustainability goals.

This paper aims to clarify how business education has and should incorporate more resources, policies and stakeholder engagement towards the incorporation of sustainability, by conducting a literature review on sustainability in business and international business education and proposing future opportunities for researchers and practitioners.

The authors take a systematic, qualitative analysis approach to evaluate multidisciplinary literatures on sustainability in business education. The authors identify 192 qualifying papers published in 68 journals between 2015 and 2023.

The authors propose five categories of education solutions. Four of them are integrated, in two macro–micro levels: university (stakeholders and shared-mindset change) and student (pedagogical methods and curriculum); and one at meso level: international business (holistic integration) serving to unify the university and student levels.

The review highlights the value of applying a holistic approach and interdisciplinary pedagogical methods in future research on sustainability education in business school to effectively prepare future business leaders to contribute to a more sustainable future.

Insights from this review can usefully guide scholars and programme directors in their future research and administrative efforts towards business curriculum design, stakeholder management and policy-making.

The findings highlight how by embracing holistic perspectives, proper policies and self-awareness, business education shapes the mindsets and skill sets of the next generation of socially conscious practitioners.

The review stands out as one of the few that offers a forward-looking trajectory for the adaptation of international business education in response to sustainability challenges, through a holistic perspective.

Given that the current sustainability assessment in higher education institutions primarily relies on qualitative methods with relatively limited quantitative tools, the purpose of this study is to design a tool that could be used to comprehensively assess the overall state of higher education institutions’ sustainability.

The authors based the “Model to Assess the Sustainability of Higher Education Institutions” on the Triple Bottom Line (TBL) framework of economic, environmental and social factors, and established its primary dimensions as educational level, research capacity, community outreach, campus operations, campus experience and assessment reports. They designed the College Organisational Sustainability Scale (CO-SS) based on this research model, drawing their inspiration from the qualitative research tool, the Sustainability Assessment Questionnaire, and taking the following validation steps: expert review (n = 10), pilot testing (n = 150) and formal experiments (n = 1108). These steps were taken to optimise the scale items, test the model’s validity and assess its reliability.

After undergoing rigorous scientific validation, CO-SS was unequivocally confirmed as an effective and reliable tool, demonstrating its accurate reflection of the level of sustainability in higher education institutions.

The authors took an industry-specific approach by relying on the TBL and the Sustainability Assessment Questionnaire to construct and validate the CO-SS. Furthermore, the CO-SS has the potential to evolve into a self-assessment tool for higher education institutions, and a reliable foundation for data-driven decision-making in the realm of organisational sustainability at universities.

This study aims to identify students’ perceptions of the importance and objectives of sustainability and business ethics education, considering contextual factors (ethics-friendly environments) and including the social desirability (SD) bias to strengthen data robustness and assess response truthfulness.

A survey was administered to 170 business students at an Icelandic university to measure their attitudes and perceptions toward sustainability and business ethics courses. Descriptive statistics, Mann–Whitney tests, χ² tests and multivariate regression were used for the analysis.

The results show no significant differences among participants, depending on individual and organizational factors. The authors did not find significant differences in gender, age or exposure to sustainability and business ethics courses concerning social desirability bias. Contextual solid factors can explain these results.

This study expands on previous research by examining students’ perceptions of sustainability and business ethics education in an “ethics-friendly environment” like Iceland, a new and fertile territory for business ethics education research. These elements are crucial for further research on students’ attitudes toward sustainability and business ethics and the role of this subject in university curricula.

In this chapter, the authors aimed to analyze the existing sustainability curriculum being followed by higher education institutions (HEIs) in the emerging world, and call out the underlying inadequacies within it and provide solutions for the same, by drawing insights through interviews with key stakeholders in this area. The authors planned to talk to higher education policymakers, Educational Institutional heads, researchers and faculty members and corporates (who deal in sustainable products and who will benefit from this subject). The respondents’ sample consisted of both Indian and international interviewees to help us better understand and analyze the perspective and scenario globally in terms of north-south as well as understand multiple point of views. The interview analyses were carried out using the N Vivo software tool. The expected outcome includes a curriculum contour on sustainability for the HEIs.

This chapter discusses the findings of a study at a public university in Malaysia, which reflect the country’s evolving situation regarding sustainability education. The study aimed to explore the knowledge of and attitudes to sustainability of the academic staff at the university, and the pedagogical approaches they used in curricula. Through a mixed method approach, primary data were collected through an online quantitative survey containing 90 statements related to Education for Sustainable Development Goals, knowledge, attitudes, pedagogical techniques, and learning objectives. Following the survey, a focus group discussion was conducted involving several academic staff from the university to explore their perspectives on current sustainability teaching practices and to identify emerging issues. Findings revealed that there were generally positive levels of understandings and attitudes among the academic staff toward education on sustainability development (ESD). Furthermore, the staff agreed highly with ESD learning objectives, and various pedagogical approaches were in use. These are important findings as the levels of awareness and attitudes among academics play a key role in shaping successful implementation of a range of pedagogical techniques for ESD goals. As well as the challenges identified in the study, the chapter puts forward useful insights and key aspects to enhance ESD practices at all levels in the country. Options for policy and practice to move beyond sustainable development as a goal or aspiration for teaching and learning to a practical and pedagogical reality of ESD practices in Malaysian higher education institutions are also discussed.

There is a growing need to train and support educators to introduce or enhance aspects of sustainability into post-secondary curriculum. The authors provide an overview of integration of curricular sustainability development and education as well as related institutional leadership at the post-secondary level. Turning to educational development for sustainability education, the authors share tools and resources to support educators from any discipline, to introduce, integrate, and/or enhance sustainability in their course, program, or initiative. The authors found very few examples of workshops to post-secondary teachers. For one such example, the Sustainability Education Intensive, a three-day workshop that the authors designed and led at the University of British Columbia. The authors summarize the workshop aspects that two years of participants found helpful, and how workshop involvement affected them as sustainability educators. The authors encourage post-secondary institutions to provide support in the form of workshops, resources, and funding to help educators introduce or enhance aspects of sustainability into their courses and programs. Students are asking for this, and, as they are future leaders, it is important that educators address the numerous environmental, social and economic issues that demand attention.

To date, higher education frameworks for teaching and learning are not designed to focus on interdisciplinary subject matters like sustainability. Consequently, based on an in-depth literature review, this chapter presents a theoretical framework for teaching and learning about sustainability. Within this framework, it is posited that opportunity to learn (OTL) about sustainability can directly influence promising practices of teaching and learning about sustainability (including both cognitively responsive teaching and teaching for sustainability) along with transformative sustainability learning outcomes. Additionally, it is posited that OTL can indirectly affect transformative sustainability learning outcomes by directly influencing promising practices of teaching and learning about sustainability. This in turn directly influences transformative sustainability learning outcomes. Implications from this framework offer a distinctive way to frame sustainability-specific subject matter and teaching practices. With respect to practice, this framework can provide critical information to instructors about how to teach sustainability. With regards to conceptual contributions, this framework can guide further research through this precise framing of discussions, as well as guiding data collection and analyses. Also, scholars can continue to examine the framework for facets that are most important, and continue to fine-tune it as it further develops and demonstrates its viability.

To effectively integrate sustainability education into accounting, the needs of stakeholders such as educators, practitioners, regulators, students, and politicians must be considered. While existing literature reflects their separate perceptions, this study considers their influence on the integration process. Sustainability accounting can play a key role in supporting sustainability practices, which businesses need to be accountable for. This study focuses on how sustainability accounting education can improve corporate sustainability practices. However, most existing studies only consider one stakeholder group, and there is a gap in literature on sustainability accounting education in developing countries, particularly in the Middle East. This study informs future researchers about various research gaps in sustainability education.

This chapter explores sustainable development of leadership strategies as a social framework in higher education to help with defining, implementing, and envisioning a sustainable future. Leaders need to develop a sustainable approach for higher education that involves all stakeholders who benefit from having educated citizens to develop common interests that develop and promote sustainable objectives that focus on shared values. An educationally sustainable approach extends beyond a current leader’s time at the institution to continue stable growth and long-term approaches around making decisions, fostering systemic innovation, developing an engaged workforce, and providing quality services and solutions. Leaders need to link sustainable strategies to the school’s mission, values, and finances to help gain consensus and align the decision-making process. In an effort to develop leaders and programs around educational sustainability, governmental organizations have been established to help develop policies and programs to create a sustainable future. Additionally, professional organizations have formed that allow leaders a chance to connect, grow skills, and lead sustainability initiatives. And, higher education institutions have created offices focused around sustainability on campus and educational programs around sustainability leadership to help develop future leaders that are able to take action based on sustainability values and creating an inclusive and reflective process for decision-making. Sustainable leadership has the power to transform society through reorienting the educational system to help people develop knowledge, skills, values, and behaviors for an ever-changing world.