Equitable pathways to 2100: Professional sustainability credentials

Abstract

Across numerous industries and occupations, professional associations are contributing to knowledge and skills for sustainability by offering new credentials. This represents an opportunity to increase students' career preparedness for clean economies that accomplish steep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions over the next thirty years. This also presents a particular opportunity to help lower-income young adults better position themselves for good jobs that make meaningful contributions to the societal transition ahead. Providing suggestions for navigating and embedding them into curricula, this article highlights seventeen sustainability credentials and mentions another fourteen. In addition to definitions, it also provides analysis of aspects such as third-party accreditation, student supports, academic and maintenance requirements, and fees. Internet research and e-mail correspondence with credentialed professionals was an iterative process in which the author set out with a list of aspects to consider, identified new aspects in the process of researching credentials, compared those aspects, and so on. The result is both a representative list of non-academic, professional credentials worth consideration as complements to the higher education curriculum as well as a set of suggestions for engaging with them in ways that foster opportunity for students from all backgrounds.