| 1. |
- Alänge, Sverker, 1951, et al.
(författare)
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Strategies and Practices for Sustainability: Experiences from Firm Level
- 2007
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Ingår i: 10th International QMOD Conference at Campus Helsingborg, Lund University, June 18-20, 2007, Lund.
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- The four system conditions for sustainability presented in Holmberg’s Ph.D. dissertation (1995) provided a foundation for the approach used by the ‘Natural Step’ both in Sweden and in several other countries (e.g. Holmberg & Robért 2000). In the 1990s Holmberg & Robért developed a ‘backcasting’ approach to strategy development in companies and was involved in several projects to introduce sustainability defined by these four system conditions. This work had a considerable impact in several firms. Electrolux established an environmental policy and a direct effect of backcasting was a decision to develop the first CFC free refrigerators, which put the company far ahead of their competitors. This is just one example that illustrates how this approach has a potential to stimulate new directions, which would not happen based on a more traditional trend-based analysis. Although these projects have been showing good results, several firms have lost their focus for working with sustainability after some time. So the question remained – how can sustainability become a natural part of strategy processes and practices in companies? An action research project was initiated in 2004 to focus on this question at three large Swedish corporations. The project aim was to further develop the backcasting approach in the context of sustainable development and to present recommendations for the process of implementation of the approach at companies. This paper discusses alternative ways of using and integrating the sustainability concept and approaches/practices in firms. The research design was an action learning approach to develop robust sustainable strategies in business units of three major firms. Representatives from the firms participated in workshops to learn together and share experiences from on-going projects in each company. Interviews were used to provide additional understanding of strategy processes within each firm.The conclusion was that sustainability can impact all parts and all processes in a firm. As a vision it is an organizing metaphor but there are also various accompanying techniques and practices. Firms choose to approach sustainability in different ways. Some view it as a major assignment for the environmental department supported by central policy committees. Others start out from the perspective that sustainability should be part of what everyone does in their normal job. In the latter case, the parallel to quality is obvious – when it really works and becomes totally integrated in the daily work - in product development, supply chain, etc. - then it becomes the paradoxical ‘invisible success’ (Book et al. 2004, Book 2006). One general observation is that it takes time to develop a thorough sustainability approach. It can be useful to view the development as a learning process where top management involvement and understanding of the link between competitive advantage and sustainability can facilitate and help speeding up the process.For strategy driven companies, the starting point is to make sustainability part of the regular strategy process, reaching the status of critical success factor. Then, there is a need for non-traditional strategy tools, such as scenario-planning and backcasting. The specific advantage of using the four system conditions as the conceptualization of sustainability is that they can be used on different levels and in different processes in an organization. First, they can provide input to different strategy processes. Second, they can support individuals’ decision-making in their daily work, e.g. choose alternatives that do not systematically increase the number of new substances in the stratosphere.
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| 2. |
- Berg Pettersen, Johan, et al.
(författare)
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Student-centered Learning Activities for Key Sustainability Competencies in Online Courses with Many Students
- 2023
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Ingår i: Proceedings of the International CDIO Conference. - 2002-1593. ; , s. 831-844
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Engineers can make a valuable contribution for a transformation towards a sustainable society. The CDIO framework, where student-active and integrated learning is intrinsic to design-implement activities, therefore also includes sustainability competencies. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate alignment between specific student-centered (active) learning activities used in digital learning environments with many students and engineering competencies for sustainability. Examples of learning activities in two such online courses are presented and evaluated in comparison to the UNESCO key competencies for sustainability. The courses are two undergraduate courses at NTNU where sustainable engineering represents the discipline knowledge. The learning activities were designed for scalability and to be operable within an entirely digital learning environment. The student-centered learning activities that are used in the courses are: i) project-based learning, ii) academic text with peer-review, iii) auto-graded computational assignments, iv) massive online course module, v) flipped classroom. We outline the design of the learning activities and map their alignment with abilities within key sustainability competencies. We discuss the effects of scalability and digital format on learning outcomes, and the student feedback and plans for further development.
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| 3. |
- Enelund, Mikael, 1965, et al.
(författare)
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Integration of education for sustainable development in a mechanical engineering programme
- 2012
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Ingår i: Proceedings of the 8th International CDIO Conference, Brisbane, Austraila.
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper presents and analyzes the integration with progression of education for sustainable development in Chalmers University of Technology’s MScEng programme in Mechanical Engineering. The programme has an idea and structure that emphasizes employability, integration of general engineering skills, authentic engineering experiences and focus on holistic view of the complete lifecycle of products and systems. The realization of these aims stress the need of an integrated and adapted sustainable development education for mechanical engineering. To reach this goal, we applied a combined top-down and bottom-up education development process that started with the formulation of programme vision and programme level learning outcomes. Faculty meetings and workshop to formulate the course learning outcomes and to map the programme level outcomes to courses in which the outcomes are satisfied followed this. The strategy became to integrate specific sustainability topics in courses where it is appropriate and to have a separate course in sustainable development to ensure that general aspects of sustainable development are included and that a team of faculty takes full responsibility for this. Design-build-test project courses are shown to be suitable arenas for integrating teaching and learning of sustainable development. Results from a student survey on perceptions of the relevance and quality of sustainability education are accounted for and discussed. Outstanding challenges in the area are identified.
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| 4. |
- Enelund, Mikael, 1965, et al.
(författare)
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Integration of education for sustainable development in the mechanical engineering curriculum
- 2013
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Ingår i: Australasian Journal of Engineering Education. - 1324-5821 .- 1325-4340. ; 19:1, s. 51-62
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper presents and analyses the integration with progression of educationfor sustainable development in Chalmers University of Technology’s MScEng programme inMechanical Engineering. The program has an aim and structure that emphasises employability,integration of general engineering skills, authentic engineering experiences with a focus on holisticview of the complete lifecycle of products and systems. The realisation of these aims stress the needof an integrated and adaptable sustainable development education for mechanical engineering. Toreach this goal, we applied a combined top-down and bottom-up education development processthat started with the formulation of program vision and program level learning outcomes. Facultymeetings and workshop were used to formulate the course learning outcomes and to map the programlevel outcomes to courses in which the outcomes are satisfi ed followed this. The strategy integratedspecifi c sustainability topics in courses where it is appropriate and to have a separate course insustainable development to ensure that general aspects of sustainable development are included andthat a team of faculty takes full responsibility for this. Design-build-test project courses are shownto be suitable arenas for integrating teaching and learning of sustainable development. Resultsfrom a student survey on perceptions of the relevance and quality of sustainability education arediscussed. Finally, continuing challenges in the area are identified
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| 5. |
- Hanning, Andreas, 1982, et al.
(författare)
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Are we educating engineers for sustainability? Comparison between obtained competences and Swedish industry's needs
- 2012
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Ingår i: International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education. - : Emerald. - 1467-6370. ; 13:3, s. 305-320
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Purpose – The aim of this study is to contribute to the quality improvement and long-term strategic development of education for sustainable development (ESD) in engineering education curricula.Design/methodology/approach – The content in 70 courses in environment and SD were characterized and quantified using course document text analysis. Additionally, two questionnaires were sent to students and alumni at Chalmers, and interviews and focus group discussions were conducted with representatives from 16 Swedish companies and five organizations.Findings – It was found that industry demands a broader range of competences in SD amongst engineers in general than what is currently provided. In total, 35 per cent of alumni claim they encounter sustainability issues from sometimes to daily in their work. However, only half of them believe they possess enough competences to make decisions from a sustainability perspective. Quantity, coverage and the level of integration in the educational programme all appear to be important for the students' perceived competences on SD and for the importance that they put on achieving SD.Originality/value – Earlier research has reported on how to further develop the idea and design of ESD and on competence needs in general. Few attempts have been made to assess industry's needs of competences in SD. This paper sheds light on how engineering universities educate for SD and benchmarks this to industry's needs in an exploratory case study, using Chalmers as an example.
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| 6. |
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| 7. |
- Hedesström, Martin, 1969, et al.
(författare)
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Investigating consistency of judgement across sustainability analysts
- 2011
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Ingår i: Sustainable Development. - : Wiley. - 1099-1719 .- 0968-0802. ; 19:2, s. 119-134
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- We compare seven major European and North American sustainability analyst organizations on how they rank-order the same set of companies with regards to environmental performance. We also compare the analyst organizations’ environmental rating schemes with regards to which evaluation criteria they include. Two industries are investigated: automobile and paper/forestry. Although there is fairly broad consensus on which automobile companies have the worst environmental performance, there is considerable disagreement about best-performers. The pattern is less clear for paper/forestry companies. With some notable exceptions, and for both industries, all rating schemes contain evaluation criteria targeting those aspects of company performance associated, according to life-cycle assessments, with the largest potential environmental impact. There are, however, significant divergences as to how many, and which, criteria of medium to low relevance are applied. Sustainability analyst organizations should make explicit to investors and evaluated companies on which theoretical and empirical grounds environmental evaluation criteria are selected.
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| 8. |
- Hedesström, Ted Martin, 1969, et al.
(författare)
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Framtidsanalyser av miljöprestanda
- 2011
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Ingår i: Hållbar utveckling - från risk till värde / L. G. Hassel, L.-O. Larsson & E. Nore (red.). - 9789144075327 ; , s. 65-72
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Bokkapitel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)
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| 9. |
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Historier : arton- och nittonhundratalens skönlitteratur som historisk källa
- 2009
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Samlingsverk (redaktörskap) (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- I denna antologi diskuteras hur skönlitteratur kan användas som källa till historiskt inriktade studier. Upprinnelsen är en konferens som hölls hösten 2008 i Göteborg, då företrädare för disciplinerna historia, idéhistoria, ekonomisk historia och litteraturvetenskap presenterade sin forskning. De många bidragen ger en översiktlig bild av forskningen kring litteratur som historisk källa bland svenska forskare.
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| 10. |
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