STUDENTS EMBRACING SUSTAINABILITY
The word ‘green’ isn’t sexy anymore
Sustainable waste management. Sustainable business management. Sustainable energy and building technician. Sustainable winemaking. Ethics and sustainability.
A movement Colleges Ontario highlighted in a
document called Colleges Driving a Sustainable Future: New Careers for
a Clean Economy in 2010 shows no signs of slowing down. Just last fall, George Brown College began offering a sustainable fashion production post-graduate certificate program that covers such timely topics as human resource ethics and environmental concerns.
Programs like Durham College’s fast-track environmental technology program prepares grads for careers in environmental technology, which has been identified by Statistics Canada as one of the top emerging employment sectors. Peterborough’s Fleming College recently launched a sustainable waste management graduate certificate program that teaches students to create waste management plans.
York University offers a graduate diploma in environmental/sustainability education. Seneca College’s sustainable business management post-graduate program focuses on the long-term economic, environmental and social value of sustainable business strategy.
“The program used to be called ‘green business management’ and we updated the name to ‘sustainable business management’ because ‘green’ isn’t the sexy word anymore – it’s about being sustainable,” says Maria Sairoglou, chair of the school of leadership and human resources.
“It’s about the environment but I don’t think the word ‘green’ was really encompassing the message people want to get across, which is sustainability in terms of long-term, continued effort towards corporate social responsibility. Even though the program’s been around for quite some time, the last few years have brought it to the forefront because society in general is starting to not just talk about it but do something about it.”
The sustainable business management program provides both applied management and project skills, as well as measurement tools needed to propose and drive sustainability initiatives in organizations. “Really, it’s a management program – a leadership program for students to understand business from a sustainable lens,” says Sairoglou.
“Most of our graduates find positions in marketing, communications, general management, supply chain – it could be a variety of things – and they then start to infiltrate their knowledge of sustainability through that position,” she says. “They’re also qualified for positions that are specifically requesting sustainability expertise. Some have been hired by the ministry of the environment.
“Some have started their own companies…and a lot have gone into consulting. Students come from a variety of backgrounds but have one thing in common. “When we ask them what they want from this program, their response is, ‘I want to start making a difference; I just need to know how,’” Sairoglou says.
Recent graduate Paula Echeveste Petrone, now an employee at Seneca, explored sustainability while completing a degree in communications in her native Mexico City and decided to pursue the Seneca program upon graduation. “The program gave me an overview of key aspects of sustainability, like how to build a business case for it and how to apply it on a day-to-day basis in any organization,” she says.
She completed a work term with Seneca helping redesign its waste reduction program and was hired to help manage an urban farm the college purchased and other sustainability initiatives.