ENLIGHT Rectors endorse ENLIGHT Sustainability Engagement

Today, at December 3rd the nine ENLIGHT rectors signed a joint Sustainability Engagement on the occasion of the ENLIGHT General Meeting.

With this joint Sustainability Engagement the ENLIGHT members want to make a strong claim to be key contributors of sustainable development and to lead by example with concrete actions in governance, education and research.

Main elements of the ENLIGHT Sustainability Engagement are:

• In line with its mission statement all ENLIGHT institutions want to underline the importance of education to empower learners to tackle major societal transitions and to promote equitable quality of life and sustainability. As future change-agents students need more opportunities to gain specific knowledge, skills and innovation potential to combat climate change. ENLIGHT wants to extend the integration of sustainability education to all study levels and throughout all disciplines and install a ‘culture of sustainability’ throughout our universities.
• While enhancing the opportunities for students to engage in international learning and for staff to cooperate with international peers, ENLIGHT is working on structural ways to harmonize internationalisation with sustainability and to reduce carbon emissions.
• As critical friends the ENLIGHT universities are committed to use the diversity of the alliance as a strength to identify frontrunner approaches and benchmarks through peer review for continuously improving our institutional policies. Our aim is to set new standards for each other as partners in improving our strategies to fight against climate change. Herein, the social dimension is essential to create equitable well-being. 

Download the full ENLIGHT Sustainability Engagement.

ENLIGHT is an alliance of nine European universities with the ambition to transform higher education and empower learners as globally engaged citizens. The ENLIGHT partners are the universities of the Basque Country (ES-PV), Bordeaux (FR), Bratislava (SK), Galway (IE), Göttingen (DE), Groningen (NL), Tartu (EE), Uppsala (SE) and Ghent (BE). ENLIGHT is funded by the European Universities initiative.

More information: Tiina Jaksman, ENLIGHT project coordinator, 737 6167, tiina.jaksman@ut.ee