Learning for a Sustainable Future

Embedding Education for Sustainable Development (ESD)

We recognise that embedding ESD across all our courses is critical in ensuring graduates take this learning forward into their future careers and lives. ESD is woven into our Educations and Research Strategies, being led and advocated by the University’s key leadership, including our Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Education (Professor Andy Dainty)  and our Deputy Vice-Chancellor Sustainability, Professor Liz Price (MBE).

Manchester Met’s aim is to embed ESD and climate change in all academic courses by 2026/27. We work to progress the ways in which ESD  and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals are integrated in curriculum through a number of means. 

Our University Strategy and our Leadership in Sustainability and Climate Change Strategy (2022-2026) set out the steps that must be taken to embed ESD and the University’s Responsible Futures group leads and provides a mechanism for embedding ESD into the formal and informal curriculum. 

Our University Teaching Academy works to ensure we provide the necessary professional development opportunities and resources to embed ESD in our curriculum, while the Education Strategy principles offer guidance on how to do this. 

The University  offers:

• An ESD course for all academic staff which introduces the concept of embedding sustainability in Higher Education curricula
• An Embedding ESD Programme, launched on the University’s Moodle learning platform supports staff to develop education and leadership in sustainability strategies to embed ESD in all programmes by 2026
• An ESD video presentation that provides an overview of embedding Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and its alignment with programmes at Manchester Met

• Provides a suite of resources for our academic community that supports student learning to achieve the wide range of knowledge, skills and values for Education for Sustainable Development, including decolonising the curriculum and Carbon Literacy

Additionally, the University hosts the UK Consortium on Sustainability Research (UK-CSR), which provides a space for dialogue, collaboration and participation around ESD.

Monitoring our progress

The University’s Responsible Futures strategic lead Deputy Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Sustainability Professor Liz Price (MBE) ensures that a key function of the project’s framework is to review and report our progress towards embedding ESD in our educational offering. 

There are a number of mechanisms utilised by the University to measure the integration of ESD:

• Annual enrolment survey: all returning students are asked whether their course provides opportunities to gain knowledge and skills relating to sustainable development with the survey findings presented in the the Sustainability Perceptions Report
• Biennial staff travel and sustainability survey:  academic staff indicate the extent to which ESD is included in their teaching with the survey findings presented in the the Sustainability Perceptions Report
• Our Responsible Futures Accreditation Audit Report outlines the progress we have made towards embedding ESD in the formal and informal curricular 

Carbon literacy

Any member of staff can participate in our  Carbon Literacy programme. We offer several versions of Carbon Literacy training to suit the needs of our staff, which include Carbon Literacy  to embed  into courses (primarily for academic staff), Carbon Literacy  for Leaders training, and Carbon Literacy for all staff. And, Carbon Literacy train-the-trainer programmes  are available for staff who wish to develop their skills further to deliver CL training to colleagues across the University. 

Embedding Education for Sustainable Development in the curriculum

Academic staff members can undertakes an Education for Sustainable Development Unit which  introduces the concept of Education for Sustainable Development and provides an overview of the debates and approaches to embedding sustainability in Higher Education curricula as part of the Postgraduate teaching courses

An Embedding ESD Programme, launched on the University’s Moodle learning platform supports staff to develop education and leadership in sustainability strategies to embed ESD in all programmes by 2026. 

Manchester Met and the Union are committed to working in equal and active partnership to maintain and progress our SOS-UK Responsible Futures Accreditation, see our joint statement of intent. 

About the accreditation

Responsible Futures is a whole-institution approach to embed sustainability and social responsibility (SRS) issues in the student and staff learning experience across Higher Education. It seeks to mainstream Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), supporting students and staff to gain the knowledge, skills, and attributes to lead society to a more just and sustainable future.

We were one of the first universities and student unions to be accredited by NUS Responsible Futures in 2015, and since this time we’ve worked in partnership to embed SRS issues to maintain ands progress our accreditation. See our latest Responsible Futures Feedback Report‌.

Responsible Futures group

University and Students’ Union staff and current students make up our Responsible Futures Group and lead a range of activities to embed SRS issues into formal and informal learning. The group is responsible for maintaining and continuously improving our Responsible Futures Accreditation.  

The group is led by Professor Liz Price (MBE), Deputy Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Sustainability. Find out more about the  Responsible Futures Group membership. 

Our Sustainability Engagement Strategic Action Plan for students and staff sets out our engagement approach for staff and students, and the actions the university will take across a broad range of areas to achieve our 2030 ambition to be a beacon of sustainable development.  

We have been asking our staff and students about their perceptions of sustainability, which help us gauge how we are embedding sustainability across our campus, practices, education and research activities. It helps us establish where we are improving year-on-year, and where we need to focus our efforts to improve our sustainability performance.  

We ask all of our students as part of the enrolment survey and our staff through a biennial travel and sustainability survey about sustainability at the University. Our most recent Sustainability Perceptions report (March 2024) outlines our key findings and a previous sustainability perceptions report is available which present our findings prior and up until 2020. 

The University supports and highlights school, faculty or research team projects for sustainable development.

The UN Sustainable Development Goals mapping project highlights this collaboration with research projects mapped against their related SDGs.

Rise is Manchester Met’s sector-leading offering that provides students with a platform to take part in and gain credit for co-curricular activities. It facilitates opportunities through playful, experiential learning activities that give students a space to explore topics and themes outside of but complementing their course curriculum. The Rise scheme  contributes significantly to implementation of the institution’s ESD strategy, and also seeks to work with local community partners to ground ESD in the culture and community of Manchester. Hundreds of opportunities  are available to our students every year, and frequently provide beneficial real-world learning environments.

The Manchester School of Art’s Unit X brought together students with partner organisations and Manchester Met departments to rethink, redesign and reimagine campus life and our relationship with plastic packaging. The Unit was undertaken in 2024 by Level 4 Product Design students who were tasked with rethinking relationships with Fast Moving Consumer Good (FMCG) packaging.

These students were challenged to redesign packaging with the aim of retaining intrinsic value for as long as possible, whilst engaging the GEN Z consumer in exploring, playing, and embracing new packaging experiences.  Students worked in groups to redesign packaging for their chosen FMCG items, with the aim of moving from a linear to a circular economy model.

Students presented their ideas to Manchester Met’s sustainability advocates and experts from professional services and faculties. The unit culminated in the Unit X Open Studios event, designed to celebrate the creative projects from undergraduate and postgraduate students from across Manchester School of Art’s collaborate curriculum, Unit X.

Natalia Gryskowska, a student on the MSc Environmental Practice, started a three-month project in June 2023 working alongside the University’s Sustainability Team and Facilities Management Teams. The project is Natalia’s placement, which is a requirement of her master’s course, and supervised by the Department of Natural Sciences. The project is designed to support the development of a biodiversity management plan for the university campus. The project involves undertaking a land cover survey on and urban green factor assessment of the green spaces on campus, interviewing key stakeholders, and developing a comprehensive GIS database indicating the various habitats on campus and plans for enhancing biodiversity. The project outputs will help consolidate previous and existing biodiversity management actions and inform our continuous improvement. The management plan will provide the key information required for the university grounds team and other stakeholders to conserve, restore, and enhance biodiversity value across our campus.

A team of staff from Manchester Metropolitan University worked in partnership with a team of four first year geography students in the Learning Design Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) Bootcamp 2022 to enhance the Professional Geographer first year  (level 4) unit.

The staff and student team went through a bootcamp process to develop the Professional Geographer curriculum, which involved putting the unit through an ESD diagnostic process to gain insight into the areas which needed improvement. Based on the results, each student proposed a new activity for the unit which included a sustainability trail, a jigsaw classroom, and the development of infographics. The team then co-developed the activities for inclusion in future curriculum design for the Professional Geographer Unit.

 The Sustainability Team and academic Dr Kosta Tzoulas (the University’s strategic lead for biodiversity) collaborated with the Landscape Architecture department in early 2022 to develop a student project as part of a landscape architecture unit to introduce students to construction and planting design in landscape architecture.  

The project was shaped around redesigning areas of landscape at the University’s Birley site – which included the sensory herb garden area and the wetland area. A group of students was set the challenge to redesign the planting scheme in the herb garden area, to align with the University’s commitment to enhance biodiversity across its estate and to examine how the areas could be more inclusive and accessible.

The unit was split into three main stages – site design, planting design, and construction design – the students were introduced to the herb garden and wetland areas by the sustainability team, and received a session from Dr Kosta Tzoulas about planting for biodiversity, sustainable urban drainage and as pollution filters.

The students produced a portfolio of technical drawings and supporting documentation, reflecting the different workshops and stages of the unit, and presented their ideas to work as part of the assessment process, and for consideration by the Sustainability Team with a view to developing the herb garden and wetland areas.

We are currently developing our approach to managing scope 3 carbon emissions, and over the course of 2022, are developing a scope 3 carbon management plan.

As part of the project, we commissioned a masters student, Olivia Downham, from the Department of Natural Sciences to undertake research that supports the development of a standard of best practice for managing scope 3 emissions in the higher education sector, linked to their Master’s degree.

Through desk-based research methods, the project aims to identify the higher education sector’s best practice for scope 3 carbon management, and to inform the University about best practice standards and frameworks in science-based carbon target setting. In addition, the project aims to develop options and recommendations for methods of best practice for scope 3 carbon management for Manchester Met to consider.

A student undertaking a BSc Criminology with quantitative methods degree undertook a project for her final year thesis with the University’s Sustainability team in 2021. The project aimed to analyse the student enrolment data from the academic year 2019/20. It came about as a result of the Q-step initiative, which aims to engage social-sciences subjects in quantitative research skills acquisition.

Manchester Met asks its students as part of its annual online enrolment process a series of questions related to sustainability to gauge student perception and university progress towards embedding sustainability. Beth’s project was an exploration into ‘perceptions of sustainability based on cohorts’ by analysing the enrolment data from the academic year 2019/20. Across the year, Beth was supported by the Sustainability Team to develop her methodology and thesis, and provided a comprehensive analysis of our enrolment data, which has been used to inform our report about Students, Staff and Sustainability at Manchester Met.   

In 2021, our arts, humanities and business students recently worked on the SHAPE Sustainability Impact Project in partnership with the SOS-UK, The British Academy and our academics and professional staff.

This was part of a wider project across the education sector to collaborate on engaging SHAPE (Social Sciences, Humanities and Arts for People and the Economy/Environment) disciplines with addressing key sustainability challenges. 

Manchester Met students formed three groups working on real-world projects determined by the University:

• to engage students in the development of the University’s 2030 Sustainability Strategy
• to determine the role that arts play in communicating and understanding sustainability
• to develop strategies for organisations to contribute to zero carbon 2038

We actively promote and provide real-world paid opportunities for students to deliver a wide range of sustainability-related activities.

Since 2015, students have been recruited to be ambassadors for sustainability, working through the University’s Jobs 4 Students scheme. We had over 30 students working directly for the sustainability and carbon literacy teams in previous years to support the delivery of our programmes. Current students can find out more and sign up.

Sustainability ambassadors and MetMUnch students have helped create our 2030 Sustainability Strategy Communications to engage our communities in telling us what should be integral to our strategy, whilst our carbon literacy facilitators deliver training to their peers across the University through a cascading model called Carbon Literacy for Staff and Students.