Search results

The Beringer Wine Estates Company has been expanding its market share in the premium segment of the wine industry in the 1990's. After operating as a wholly owned subsidiary of the giant Nestlé food company for almost a quarter of a century, the firm was sold in 1996 to new owners, in a leveraged buyout. For the next year and a half, management and the new owners restructured the firm and expanded through internal growth and strategic acquisitions. With a heavy debt load from the LBO, it seemed prudent for management to consider a significant rebalancing of its capital structure. By paying off a portion of its debt and enhancing the equity account, the firm would achieve greater financial flexibility which could enhance its growth rate and business options. Finally, a publicly held common stock would provide management with another “currency” to be used for enhancing its growth rate and overall corporate valuation. With the equity markets in turmoil, significant strategic decisions had to be made quickly. Should the IPO be completed, with the district possibility of a less than successful after market price performance and these implications for pursuing external growth initiatives? A variety of alternative courses of action and their implications for the financial health of the Beringer Company and the financial wealth of Beringer stockholders are integral components of this case.

The purpose of this paper is to prepare for a campus sustainability audit at the main campus of Brock University, St Catharines, Ontario, Canada.

An inductive, qualitative approach was undertaken with data comprised of analyses of key stakeholder interviews, a review of literature, and a systematic collation of campus‐based sustainability initiatives taking place in 2008‐2009.

The study offers qualitatively analyzed evidence that even smaller and mid‐size Canadian campuses with limited budgets can successfully move forward with sustainability initiatives in multi‐systemic, synergistic partnerships that cross‐professional and disciplinary boundaries. Furthermore, inductive methodologies should not be overlooked in this process. While most of the sample of interviewees in this exploratory study agreed to be involved in current and future sustainability initiatives, interestingly, there were also concerns that discovery of any negative findings could cast a shadow on “green” efforts already underway. The findings also indicate a number of leading edge initiatives taking place at Brock University including a co‐generation power plant, and “green” construction of new buildings as well as those in the planning stages. Without a formal governance structure or a common theoretical framework in place, a broad spectrum of definitions on “sustainability” from key stakeholders was found ranging from an environmental focus to those based solely upon economics, and a combination of the two were prevalent. The absence of any systemic, coordinated and comprehensive approach on the university's main campus was the main negative finding – one that previously hampered growth of synergistic partnerships.

Owing to its geographical location in the Canada's Niagara Escarpment as one of UNESCO's World Heritage Biospheres and its recent emergence as a comprehensive university, it is apparent that Brock University is well placed with potential for a leadership role in promoting ethical and green consumption practices on its campuses and within the region. This qualitative study provides a contemporary, interdisciplinary conceptual framework for understanding how important synergies may be brought to bear in this new policy arena within and beyond academia.

This paper aims to know how university’s strategic managers, from botacademic and administrative systems, perceive the relationship between sustainability and accreditation as sustainability incorporation and the quality of their processes are amongst the actual challenges of universities.

This paper opted for an inductive, exploratory study using the case study approach, including 19 in-depth interviews to administrative and academic managers in a private, high-quality certified university in Colombia. The data were assessed using the content analysis methodology. The Colombian accreditation guidelines were the base to analyse the data as accreditation is part of the quality assurance system.

This paper provides empirical insights into how the implementation of sustainability in universities relates to the Colombian accreditation factors. The main links found were in the areas of the university’s social impact and organisational responsibility, which are highly relevant to graduates, external stakeholders and sustainability skills. Sustainable campus operation was associated with environmental management and improvement of the quality of the physical plant, with social and economic benefits in the long-term. Additionally, this research found a need for administrative and academic managers to understand and increase their commitment to sustainability.

Because it was a case study, results are not generalisable. Consequently, further research on similar lines is required to universalise the mentioned observation and results.

The accreditation factors related to sustainability, inductively defined and exposed in this paper, provide an idea of how sustainability implementation could contribute to higher education quality assurance.

This paper contributes to filling the knowledge gap about embedding sustainability in Latin-American universities. This paper postulates a starting point considering accreditation standards and the link of the strategic manager’s perceptions of sustainability.

This study aims to explore various determinants of university attractiveness and its relationship with sustainable institutes. Further, the study examines the mediating role of perceived student support and sense of belongingness on the relationship between university attractiveness and sustainable institutes.

The data analysis was conducted with 637 responses from the students from private universities located in the northern region of India. Variance based partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was applied in the study to investigate the proposed conceptual model on sustainable higher institutions. Additionally, by applying PLS Predict, the predictive relevance of sustainable institutions with important and performing constructs was found out.

The results of this study indicate that university attractiveness plays a critical role in enhancing perceived student support, and it has a direct and significant impact on developing sustainable institutes. Further, students’ sense of belongingness is expressed as significant mediator between university attractiveness and sustainable institutes. The predictive relevance of the study was reported to be high. Most important indicators of university attractiveness were found to be teaching, research and publications, branding and promotion, and diversity in courses offered by the private universities.

The conceptual model under study can be investigated with a moderating effect of private and government universities in future. Additionally, the role of additional variables in online scenario under current pandemic situation can be assessed through the model used in this study. Future research can be done by using qualitative analysis through thematic analysis and sentiment analysis of students in higher education institutes.

The present study is the first to explore the mediating relationship of perceived student support and sense of belongingness with university attractiveness and sustainable institutes. The conceptual framework can prove to be important for education specialists, administrators of education institutes at university level and policymakers. The study offers effective ideas for policymakers to bring sustainability in education sector in near future especially in emerging economies and attain sustainable development goals.

The purpose of this study is to comprehend the traumatic experiences of intensive care unit (ICU) patients during the COVID-19 pandemic and the impact of the same post-discharge. It assesses the role of nature and open green spaces on the mental health and well-being of critically ill patients.

Using interpretative phenomenological analysis, this study highlights the major factors contributing to adverse mental health and well-being. The subjects were interviewed using semi-structured personal interview techniques. Thematic content analysis was adapted to derive the major themes apparent in the succinctly rich information gathered from the participants.

The findings cast light on the significant role of nature and open green spaces in psychotherapeutic healing post-discharge of intensive care survivors.

The study is novel and adds to the existing literature in an advanced manner. To the best of the author’s knowledge, no other study was witnessed, especially in the Indian context, confirming the relationship between humans and nature with ICU patients as a subset.

The purpose of this paper is to show the activities that have been implemented in Monterrey Campus of Tecnológico de Monterrey to infuse sustainable development (SD) into the academic components, as well as to document similar SD activities that are being implemented in other campuses within the Tecnológico de Monterrey system. Another relevant issue is to share the experiences regarding SD incorporation in the academic area.

Capacity building courses to “educate‐the‐educators,” is the selected approach, to educate faculty regarding SD. Additionally, diverse methods are utilized to assess progress in incorporation of SD into courses and curricula. The capacity building is done through specific courses that are taught by faculty members with recognised knowledge in their fields but who also had the interdisciplinary skills to help the educators to understand and apply the concepts of the “triple bottom line”, to their academic programme. The educational programme is focused upon educators who expressed personal and professional interest in expanding their skills to teach SD to their students.

It is learned that working to catalyze the inclusion of SD concepts into courses and curricula requires a concerted effort among various stakeholders within the institution. It needs support from top administration, deans of academic divisions, the academic development department, as well as from faculty willing to participate in incorporating SD into their courses. Without this support, advances will be slow or non‐existent. A first course to incorporate SD in the educators' courses is offered, but one difficulty that the authors encountered, with this initial course, is it does not provided an integrated and interconnected outlook, which shows the learners not only the triple bottom line concepts but also other dimensions relevant to SD. So, a second course is designed and evaluation of the improvements in SD understanding by educators who take this improved course is done using conceptual maps. Although no definitive instruments are developed, work is done on the development and testing of criteria to assess the degree of incorporation of SD into the modified courses taught by the participating faculty.

It is shown that it is possible to support efforts to “weave SD as a golden thread” into the academic component of a HEI can be accomplished through the concerted action of various stakeholders. Good team teaching can facilitate faculty capacity building in SD. The evolutionary path of the “educate‐the‐educator's” program is one of the learnings by doing and continuous improvement. It is hoped that others will learn from the learning process.

This paper aims to investigate the roles of leadership in enabling sustainability transformation of universities and higher sustainability management education. It advocates research into the role of leadership for a university’s sustainability transformation by exploring interactions between university members and institutional contexts.

Using a case study approach, this study explores the sustainability transformation of a university and its influence on the MBA Sustainability Management by applying Mintzberg’s leadership framework.

The findings suggest that leaders can strongly influence a process of change in mindsets, practices and curricula to incorporate sustainability into higher business education institutions. Whereas bottom-up leadership initiatives are crucial, leadership support from top management is seen as important to enable larger, more radical steps of transformation.

It is worthy noting that in the medium run strategic leadership to develop good sustainability management education programs requires a consistent institutional commitment for sustainability.

The purpose of this paper is to examine green university initiatives in the context of China, using Tsinghua University, which is China’s green university pioneer, as a case study.

The research method used for this paper is a case study based on participant observation and document analysis. The approach to data collection includes the examination of archive records, yearbooks and statistical information regarding Tsinghua University.

This paper finds that Tsinghua’s green university initiative is a response to Tsinghua’s strategy of establishing a word-class university, with a goal of bearing more responsibility in promoting a sustainable society. Tsinghua employs one principle (green university) and three dimensions (green education, green research and green campus) to frame its green university initiative. Tsinghua’s green university initiative has earned many achievements, but it has also faced many challenges, such as ignoring social justice, fragmented coordination efforts and the lack of effective communication and assessment mechanisms.

As a leading university and the pioneering green university in the country, Tsinghua University is very influential with regard to the development of green universities in China. Many other universities have designed their own programs based on Tsinghua’s experiences in the green university initiative. As such, Tsinghua’s experiences provide reference values to other universities in China.

This paper comprehensively examines the evolution, framework, achievements and challenges of the green university initiative of Tsinghua University. It helps the audience to know how China’s universities understand and practice education for sustainable development.

To introduce the campus sustainability assessment framework (CSAF) as a campus sustainability audit methodology; to share student campus sustainability audit research; to reflect on using the CSAF for pedagogy; to review the usefulness of the CSAF as an action research instrument; to encourage other faculty/sustainability educators to incorporate the CSAF into their curriculum; to present the Sierra Youth Coalition, Canada Sustainable Campuses project as a campaign worth emulating in other countries; to build the body of knowledge in using sustainability audits to integrate research, education, and campus operations.

The paper describes the Sierra Youth Coalition Sustainable Campuses project, a national student campus sustainability campaign in Canada, and how its campaign tool, the CSAF, was implemented at the University of Prince Edward Island (UPEI) to facilitate project‐based sustainability education. The paper shares the author's rationale and experience of using the CSAF to conduct UPEI's first campus sustainability audit, and of offering the CSAF for course credit.

The UPEI CSAF experience suggests the CSAF is a constructive tool for post‐secondary sustainability education; that it is possible to assess the ten CSAF sections (water, materials, air, energy, land; health and wellbeing, community, knowledge, governance, economy and wealth) and the total of 169 indicators in less than one academic year; and that students value the hands‐on learning, practical outcomes, and national recognition afforded by conducting a campus sustainability audit using the CSAF.

The UPEI experience can encourage other universities and colleges, in particular post‐secondary institutions in Canada, in synergizing sustainability research, education, and campus operations.

The paper will help Canadian faculty to evaluate the CSAF as a pedagogical tool and as an audit instrument. Non‐Canadian readers may glean insights for integrating student activism into higher education for sustainability. Researchers, educators, and university administrators keen to improve the sustainability performance of their institution can benefit by learning from UPEI's integrative approach.

This study aims to examine the characteristics of scientific publications that address the management of higher education institution (HEI) libraries from a sustainability perspective, through a bibliometric analysis, to contribute to the development of knowledge and to identify opportunities for further research.

The knowledge development process-constructivist instrument was used to select a portfolio of 24 articles that are scientifically acknowledged and aligned with the theme “Sustainable Management of Libraries in Higher Education Institutions” and delimited by the authors. This study, guided by a constructivist perspective, was carefully conducted to discern selections that differ from traditional definitions. The analysis followed a qualitative approach and used the following variables: fruitful authors, connection networks between authors and vision of sustainability (the degree of dimensional coverage).

The analysis of the literature highlighted the partnerships of authors from countries belonging to the American continent as the most involved in research on the subject and the evolution from a one-dimensional view – centred on the environment – to a multidimensional view.

The understanding is that library management in HEIs, from a sustainability perspective, is an essential aspect of institutional legitimacy for the stakeholders. Therefore, sustainability should be treated in a multidimensional way and integrated with the institution’s values.