Colleges have an important role to play in addressing climate change and sustainable community development. Among the levers available, applied research is a preferred tool for leveraging scientific expertise within colleges to generate multiple impacts in their communities.

The session will begin with the presentation of an applied research project on the valorization of carbon through the development of an industrial symbiosis to reduce the GHG emissions of a large emitter while promoting socio-economic benefits. This project is a good example of collaboration between social and technological innovation players from two colleges with one industrialist and several partners. Emphasis will be placed on sharing some of the tools that have been used, such as multi-criteria analysis, participatory thinking and assessing the carbon footprint of activities, as well as on the main benefits and challenges of the project. The presentation will be interactive by using the Mentimeter application to invite participants to provide feedback on the project presented, as well as suggest relevant approaches or tools to develop and strengthen college-industry partnerships. The second part of the session will focus on the suggestions brought forward; the challenges associated with this type of collaboration and the most promising ways to fast-track the fight against climate change and, more generally, the adoption of responsible industry practices.

Meeting the SDGs is an international effort that requires students to have a global perspective while working on specific local projects that contribute to the larger goals. Self-directed and SDG-focused international work integrated learning experiences are a powerful way for students to develop a global understanding of issues and for them to contribute to achieving the SDGs on-the-ground while abroad.  However, students need support in planning and preparing for these experiences. This session will discuss the challenges and benefits of supporting students to take on these kinds of experiences and explore opportunities for partnerships as well as different planning tactics to better support students to embark on their international SDG journeys.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a blueprint for collaboration to create positive change. They are a global call to action for countries, communities, and higher education institutions to come together to co-create solutions to the fundamental challenges facing the global community – like poverty, hunger, inequality, and climate change – and lay the groundwork for a long-term equitable, peaceful, and prosperous future.

As we are now less than a decade away from 2030, it is more urgent than ever to think critically about how higher education institutions can take on this role in supporting the necessary transformations towards the 2030 Agenda.

Colleges and communities are under growing pressure to reduce carbon emissions to zero in less than 30 years. There is significant need and potential for transforming technical, governance, and policy approaches within these settings, but design and implementation rely on developing capacity and skills. Credible, replicable plans and planning processes are essential to aligning key actors and opening access to necessary capital, yet many need help to accomplish these aims. An initiative among approximately twenty institutions in Ontario and Michigan seeks to address this need with a comprehensive framework and global expertise. This cohort-based approach leverages multiple institutional partners’ resources, knowledge and innovative practices and aims to create consistency in the resulting methods and recommendations. In this session, participants will hear from a subset of these members whose organizations have achieved breakthrough planning and implementation performance, and energy and carbon reductions. They will share insights, approaches and anticipated steps to advance the cohort’s work.

CICan members are committed not only to Net Zero but to Reconciliation. Indigenous Peoples have been caretakers of this land known as Canada for millennia and have a great deal to teach us about sustainability. Many CICan members have been honouring and integrating Indigenous approaches to sustainable campus operations, including buildings, landscaping, and planning. Join some of these champions to hear about the many ways that Two-Eyed Seeing can improve and accelerate the transition to Net Zero while deepening our commitment to Reconciliation.

World Wildlife Fund Canada (WWF-Canada) recognizes educational institutions as leaders in achieving national biodiversity and climate goals. Through partnerships with colleges and institutions across Canada, WWF-Canada can build capacity to increase conservation efforts that recover wildlife, fight climate change, and support institutional sustainability goals that engage students, employees and communities. In this session, WWF-Canada and Niagara College will highlight national and global climate and biodiversity goals and outline activities they have collaborated on to address biodiversity loss and climate change while helping to implement action towards institutional sustainability strategies and advance progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals. Initiatives such as pollinator gardens, native plant seed orchards, and invasive species reduction will illustrate how students, employees and communities have been engaged to build capacity and enhance knowledge and leadership skills in conservation and sustainability.

In the 2022/2023 academic year, Kwantlen Polytechnic University (KPU) embarked on a journey to identify initiatives in the campus ecosystem that contribute to the advancement of the SDGs: from academic courses and programs, research, services, policies, to other programming and initiatives. The project team, comprised of faculty members, students, and alumni, employed a campus community approach where extensive consultations and informant conversations were held with internal community members (administrators, faculty, staff, and students) and external collaborators (CICan, SDSN, other post-secondary institutions). Additionally, an environmental scan was conducted to explore notable practices from national and international post-secondary institutions that KPU can learn and draw from. The identification process, known as Step 1 in the SDG integration process (Sustainable Development Solutions Network – Australia/Pacific, 2017), uncovered areas of strength that might be offered as best practice examples for other post-secondary institutions, and as well, potential for opportunities to inform KPU’s strategic planning and direction to align with its Campus 2050 Campus Master Plan. Themes of recommendations include: enhancing cross-functional collaboration and reporting of the SDGs, promoting and supporting teaching with the SDGs, and educating the KPU community on the SDGs at every opportunity. In this session, project team members and KPU’s VPA who commissioned the project share their process and learning and exchange insights with conference delegates.

The Campus Biodiversity Network is a new consortium of post-secondary institutions working together to study campus greenspace and biodiversity in Quebec and beyond. Using citizen-science tools to monitor and evaluate biodiversity on campus greenspace, the Campus Biodiversity Network enables colleges to formulate and share their institution’s individual biodiversity baselines. The advantages of compiling and sharing collective biodiversity observations are numerous: on a technical level, the shared data allows colleges and institutes to see the cumulative tallies for campus biodiversity observations across all institutions; to identify the presence or absence of specific species, including at-risk pollinators, which many cities (including Montreal) have committed to protecting in urban spaces; and to make informed landscape-management and greenspace-design decisions. Perhaps even more importantly, the network provides a convenient means to encourage students, staff, and faculty to get out into nature without leaving campus. Results from our first year show that at some campuses, such as Vanier, the project has increased student contact with nature on campus ten-fold. We know such exposure to nature has immediate benefits (White 2019) for students and staff alike. This panel will offer attendees the tools necessary to begin doing citizen science on campus, regardless of background or expertise. The session will present a snapshot of our colleges’ individual (curricular and extracurricular) biodiversity initiatives, and show attendees how easy and effective it is to make biodiversity observations through the Campus Biodiversity Network, encouraging other institutes and colleges to join us.

The PIN-WFCP Leadership Summit is an opportunity for senior post secondary management attending the congress to engage in strategic thinking and share experiences about today’s key leadership issues.

The PIN-WFCP Leadership Summit is an opportunity for senior post secondary management attending the congress to engage in strategic thinking and share experiences about today’s key leadership issues.