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This paper explores an introduction to sustainability and deregulation of public universities. In looking to the future we look at an increasing number of people who realize the degradation of the environment and how this will test growing success and economic justice. A succession of United Nations conferences and NGO (Non- Governmental Organizations) meetings in the 1990s delivered an outline in which the consequence and effects of sustainability have been explained, In these key global events representatives of governments, professional, and civil society have met to wrestle with the path of change. They formed a series of global understandings, including: Agenda 21. The global understandings developed with U.S government input, set favorable policy directions for a sustainable future (Clugston, 1996). Agenda 21, adopted by the 1992 Earth Summit, highlights that human population, utilization and technology are the principal driving powers of environmental change. Agenda 21 additionally states “education is critical for promoting sustainable development and improving the capacity of all people to address environment and development issues”(Agenda 21,1994). An undertaking to uphold sustainability in higher education.
Solution
Introduction
The Australian Government has for long promulgated a wide spectrum of environmental policies in order to minimize the impact of government operations in the environment. There are a number of agency measures as well as targets for carbon-emissions, waste and resource utilization based on the set of mandatory environmental standards for incorporating sustainability in government procurements (Cuthill, 2002).
Sustainable development forms a significant part of the next wave of the modern environmentalism and embarks on a journey towards tackling environmental issues. It was well argued by the environmentalists and policy makers that the exponential growth of the populations and industrial activities would fail to sustain without seriously depleting the resources of the planet (Davidovits, 2008). The Australian federal and state governments, therefore, have been following the international trends, introduced clean air Acts, clean water Acts and legislation that have formed regulatory agencies for controlling pollution and managing waste disposal (Folke et al., 2002).
This report tries to explore different sustainability along with the deregulation of public universities. It essentially highlights the increased number of social workers and NGOs that have been realizing the impacts of degradation of environment and its consequences on the sustainability of the environment.
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Eco-Social Work
The economies and societies of the present day require effective and efficient regulations in order to support growth, investment, innovation and market liberty at the same time. While, a poor regulatory framework undermines competitiveness and, so, the trust on the policies of the government gets reduced (Bueren, 2012). A number of governments did not recognize the importance of environmental issues, which is why the local communities kept mounting pressure on the governance regarding pollution control and environmental sustainability (Byron, n.d.). The issues that have been primarily highlighted by different social workgroup and NGOs are as follows:
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Extensive utilization of energy
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Greenhouse gas emissions and ozone-depleting compounds
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Suppliers, products and wide use of materials
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Industrial waste, office waste, building waste, and resource recovery procedures.
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The wide use of water and wastewater treatment
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Non-compliance with the legal obligations
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Reluctance to minimize pollution
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Conspicuous lack of systematic environmental approach, which should be consistent with the international standards.
Waste of Resources – Recovery and Challenges
The recovery of the waste resources cuts across the simple elements of reducing, reuse or recycle. The Australian municipal bodies, environmental entities as well as government agencies are facing a number of challenges as to how aptly and efficiently should the waste be minimized, but also to make sure that their stakeholders see the inherent profit potential in the waste materials (Hunter, 1997). Therefore, by utilizing the resource recovery facilities, the water recycling plants and waste to energy entities have been able to act along with the municipal bodies in order to make the efficient recovery of the waste materials.
Waste to Energy: There are a number of dedicated waste to energy facilities in various regions in which the putrescible waste is collected from different areas in different states, and methane thus generated from the decomposing waste is being used a fuel for electricity generation. So, such residual waste by processing through bio-energy technologies has been helping to create a viable sources of energy (Florin, Maddocks, Wood, & Harris, 2009).
Water Recycling: It is a crucial aspect of water resource management that certainly boosts the overall water availability by providing an alternative and additional water supply. In Australia, the successful implementation of water recycling facilities also provides a big boost to irrigation in agriculture.
Material Recovery Plants: The material recovery facilities being established in different parts of Australia are uniquely specialized in sorting and collection of recyclable materials. In the next step, they are forwarded to a number of recyclers who transform these materials back into useful products (Cui & Zhang, 2008).
Higher Education and Sustainability
The policymakers, as well as environmentalists in Australia, felt a compelling need for the higher education sector to contribute towards the creation of more robust and sustainable societies. However, the recent developments in the sector have shown that these positive changes will take time in which the higher educational institutions will re-structure their approaches to bring sustainability (Shephard, 2008). There is a much-needed rethinking in the re-alignment of organizational principles and cultural practices.
The Australian Government can be given the credit of playing a pivotal role in making efforts to transform the higher education system towards the adoption of sustainability. In relation to this, the government had started a number of policies such as Living Sustainability: The Australian Government’s National Action Plan for Education for Sustainability as well as National Vocational Education and Training Sector Sustainability Policy and Action Plan (2009-2012). These policies have been instrumental in developing and motivating to enhance the efforts in this sector (Tilbury, 2004).
There have been a number of networks that were crucial in supporting the re-orientation process across the Australian higher education system. The institutions such as Australian Campuses towards Sustainability (ACTS) have been instrumental in bringing together the universities and individuals that have been putting efforts to make sure that the higher education system in Australia along with New Zealand becomes sustainable. There have been a number of academicians, administrators, campus managers and sustainability officers who enabled this university communication (Scott, 2012). Therefore, the bodies like ACTS have done a commendable job in supporting the sustainability champions in recent years and celebrated good practice in a wide spectrum of activities, especially campus greening.
Eco-Social Work through Sustainability in Universities
The numerous initiatives that have enhanced sustainability in the Australian higher education system are characterized by addressing sustainability in the curriculum and also include the research efforts of the institutions. These social and community engagements are within and outside of the institutions. As per the latest data of the education sector, the aging academic population in the Australian higher education indicate that maximum academicians had begun their academic careers even before the concerns regarding the sustainability were in the public domain (Isaias & Issa, 2013). Which is why, the sustainability, being interdisciplinary in nature that is ever-complex and dynamic in nature, becomes an issue that, many academicians feel, are inadequately prepared to be addressed.
Australia has also invested considerably in scientific and technological research in order to identify sustainable solutions to effectively address current issues. There are impressive research centers such as the Sustainability Policy Institute at Curtin University along with Sustainable Futures Institute at the University of Technology, Sydney that have profoundly undertaken social research for sustainability (Rankin, 2009).
In Australian higher educational institutions, the greening of operations and management frameworks has gained wide recognition and appreciation. In this regard, the Australian National University pioneered in setting up of a Green Office, and by watching this trend, most of the universities have followed suit (Lozano, Lukman, Lozano, Huisingh, & Lambrechts, 2013). The development of ecologically sustainable buildings in higher education was the next big step.
By the collaboration of United Nations Conferences and NGOs during the decade of the 1990s, an outline was emerging in which the consequences and effects of sustainability were explained. In these conferences, the representatives of different governments created a series of global understandings including Agenda 21. In this regard, the global understandings developed with the US government set different policy directions for a sustainable future (Bekessy, Samson, & Clarkson, 2007).
University–Fee Deregulation Policy
“Universities educate most of the people who develop and manage society’s institutions. For this reason, universities bear profound responsibilities to increase the awareness, knowledge, technologies, and tools to create an environmentally sustainable future” (Report and Declaration of the President's Conference, 1990).
Since the year 2014, the fee-deregulation in the Australian higher institutions has become an emergent issue in Australian public discourse. A quantitative study has been conducted in different localities in Australia, which revealed that fee-deregulation in the higher institutions might lead to fee increases. Therefore, in terms of social justice, the deregulation of the fees in the Universities has produced passionate debates in the country. This argument largely supports the process of expansion of higher education by promoting and widening participation of equal opportunity as well as increasing the number of educational institutions (Kwadwo Adusei, Awidi, & Hancock, 2016).
Now the research question that arises here at this point in time is “how would a deregulated university fee system affect the sustainability in the higher educational institutions”?
The rationale behind the pushing of deregulation of university fees in Australian institutions may be an ideology that is based on economic rationalism. However, it had not considered the wider implications in different social strata. Therefore, as per the study and research conducted in different regions, the prospective impact of deregulation can negatively impact sustainability in the higher institutions (Carter, Pisaniello, & Burritt, 2016). Even in this inexcusable situation though, universities are vital to the future of a cultural and prosperous society. They are now facing significant cuts that could only be completely reversed if the students pay more.
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Ecological sustainability views the situation as a self-motivated outcome resulting from collaboration among all components that inhabit the ecosystem. The importance of theories such as systems and person-in-environment reflect the deep rootedness of this method in social work (Green & McDermott, 2010). The ecological sustainability method is lacking in that it does not take into thought the role of power (Dominelli & Hackett, 2012). The Brundtland Commission report clearly acknowledged it. Sustainability is consequently about the well-being of the existing as well as coming generations. The significance of catering to future generations is imbedded into sustainability methods and reinforced by social development and human rights approaches. More importantly, from a sustainability perspective, the social work discipline does so taking into consideration the generational ties that bind people within groups, families, and communities. Overall, social work offers skill sets and tools necessary to address issues of intergenerational equity characteristic of ecological approaches to sustainability. Activities oriented toward ecological sustainability have become increasingly oriented toward developing trusteeship and enabling communities and individuals to protect and maintain local resources.
References
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Bueren, E. (2012). Sustainable urban environments. Dordrecht: Springer.
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Carter, A., Pisaniello, J., & Burritt, R. (2016). Government sustainability policy in Australia: moving from rhetoric to effective implementation. unisa.edu.au. Retrieved 25 October 2016, from https://unisa.edu.au/Global/business/centres/cags/docs/Occasional%20Working%20Papers/CAGS_Occasional_Working_Paper_No%203%202010.pdf
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Cui, J. & Zhang, L. (2008). Metallurgical recovery of metals from electronic waste: A review. Journal Of Hazardous Materials, 158(2-3), 228-256. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jhazmat.2008.02.001
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Cuthill, M. (2002). Exploratory research: citizen participation, local government, and sustainable development in Australia. Sustainable Development, 10(2), 79-89. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/sd.185
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Davidovits, J. (2008). Geopolymer proceedings. Saint-Quentin: Institute Geopolymer.
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Dominelli, L. & Hackett, S. (2012). Social Work Responses to the Challenges for Practice in the 21st Century. International Social Work, 55(4), 449-453. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0020872812440784
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Florin, N. H., Maddocks, A. R., Wood, S., & Harris, A. T. (2009). High-temperature thermal destruction of poultry derived wastes for energy recovery in Australia. Waste Management, 29(4), 1399-1408.
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