Advising for Sustainability: A Challenge

Abstract

Our society needs sustainable solutions to unprecedented and interconnected environmental, social, and economic problems. Advisors must join campus colleagues who are incorporating sustainability into institutional operations and curricula by engaging in “advising for sustainability.” This article first provides practical ways to take advantage of the unique opportunities offered to advisors by recommending and discussing academic options related to sustainability. It also interrogates advising’s teaching function and suggests that, by adapting critical pedagogy to our advising practices, we can engage in reflective advising conversations that probe our institutional complicity in global environmental crisis and urge our students to interrogate their behaviors and goals to embrace more sustainable ones.