| Overall Rating | Gold - expired |
|---|---|
| Overall Score | 73.16 |
| Liaison | Ryan Ihrke |
| Submission Date | July 29, 2011 |
| Executive Letter | Download |
Green Mountain College
ER-8: Sustainability Courses by Department
| Status | Score | Responsible Party |
|---|---|---|
|
7.00 / 7.00 |
Bill
Throop Provost Provost's Office |
The number of departments that offer at least one sustainability-related or -focused course :
The total number of departments that offer courses:
A list of departments that offer sustainability courses:
Three years ago Green Mountain College eliminated its eight academic departments in order to streamline administrative structures and increase interdisciplinary collaboration. The College created three academic divisions: Environmental Studies and Management; Science and Outdoor Leadership, and Humanities, Education and Arts, which function in a similar manner as departments in larger universities. The division chairs oversee and evaluate the 15 to 20 faculty in their division and they are responsible for the quality of all degree programs offered by the division. Faculty are assigned to one or more degree programs, many of which have only one to three full-time faculty. Since degree program faculties do not function as departments and since many faculty contribute to multiple degree programs, we have chosen to use divisions as the operative category for responding to STARS items related to department level assessments. We note, however, that requiring institutions to quantify sustainability courses using standard academic departments presupposes that an institution’s means of addressing the inherently interdisciplinary field of sustainability should be assessed by distribution of courses/research across disciplinary areas. We believe that institutions that emphasize sustainability education across the curriculum will best advance this project by eliminating discipline-based departments.
Each of our three Divisions listed below offer many sustainability courses:
Environmental Studies and Management
Science and Outdoor Leadership
Humanities, Education and Arts
The website URL where the publicly available sustainability course inventory that includes a list of departments that offer sustainability courses is available:
A copy of the sustainability course inventory :
Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
In 2007, Green Mountain College eliminated its eight academic departments in order to streamline administrative structures and increase interdisciplinary collaboration. The College created three academic divisions, Environmental Studies and Management; Science and Outdoor Leadership, and Humanities, Education and Arts, which play the role that departments play in larger universities. The division chairs oversee and evaluate the 15 to 20 faculty in their division; they are responsible for the quality of all degree programs offered by the division. Faculty are assigned to one or more degree programs, many of which have only one to three full-time faculty. Since degree program faculties do not function as departments and since many faculty contribute to multiple degree programs, we have chosen to use divisions as the operative category for responding to STARS items related to department level assessments. We note, however, that requiring institutions to quantify sustainability courses using standard academic departments presupposes that an institution’s means of addressing the inherently interdisciplinary field of sustainability should be assessed by distribution of courses/research across disciplinary areas. We believe that institutions that emphasize sustainability education across the curriculum will best advance this project by eliminating discipline-based departments.
In 2007, Green Mountain College eliminated its eight academic departments in order to streamline administrative structures and increase interdisciplinary collaboration. The College created three academic divisions, Environmental Studies and Management; Science and Outdoor Leadership, and Humanities, Education and Arts, which play the role that departments play in larger universities. The division chairs oversee and evaluate the 15 to 20 faculty in their division; they are responsible for the quality of all degree programs offered by the division. Faculty are assigned to one or more degree programs, many of which have only one to three full-time faculty. Since degree program faculties do not function as departments and since many faculty contribute to multiple degree programs, we have chosen to use divisions as the operative category for responding to STARS items related to department level assessments. We note, however, that requiring institutions to quantify sustainability courses using standard academic departments presupposes that an institution’s means of addressing the inherently interdisciplinary field of sustainability should be assessed by distribution of courses/research across disciplinary areas. We believe that institutions that emphasize sustainability education across the curriculum will best advance this project by eliminating discipline-based departments.
The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.