How can we educate university students around the world on important sustainability topics? You cannot talk to them all in the same way as those in other countries – because different countries and cultures have different attitudes and priorities.
Dr Stephen Homer has gone from being a commercial fisherman and a fishmonger to a leader on sustainability education at Sunway Business School in Malaysia, inspired by his experiences before moving into academia.
He tells us all about the Principles of Responsible Management Education (PRME) and how they help management and business schools make sense of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Stephen explains the need to educate students on sustainability actions, so they take values with them into their careers; how different universities take varying approaches to sustainability; and the importance of understanding what students want to learn.
We talk about Malaysia’s chocolate and palm oil industries; the desire of students in Malaysia to achieve economic success, and how his can be balanced with sustainability; the challenges of delivering a sustainability education that is interesting and engaging to the country’s different ethnic groups, and to those on a wide range of programmes; and the problem of accountancy students (to Jan’s disgust).
Discover more about Stephen and his work here: https://sunwayuniversity.edu.my/sunway-business-school/staff-profiles/dr-stephen-thomas-homer
Find out about PRME here: https://www.unprme.org/about/
And read Lancaster University Management School’s PRME report here: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/media/lancaster-university/content-assets/documents/lums/PRME-Report.pdf
Transforming Tomorrow
Sustainability is key for any business that wants to build a lasting legacy. From carbon footprints to biodiversity to modern slavery, seabeds to factory floors, everything matters.
On Transforming Tomorrow, we make the complex understandable, the theory practical, as we guide you through the ever-changing and often exciting world of sustainability in business.
Speaking to internationally renowned experts and business leaders, we uncover how to mainstream environmental, social and economic sustainability into purposeful business strategy and performance.
Whether you are leading transition in your business, want to build a corporation with a green heart or change your individual actions, or just want to know more about how space weather might affect your operations, Transforming Tomorrow is the show for you.
Hosts Jan and Paul bring insight, perspective, and not a little amount of disagreement, to all the subjects, helping you find the message among the madness.
Join us every Monday to uncover new insights and become a little more inspired that you can make a difference.
You can find transcripts for most episodes at: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/pentland/resources-for-education-and-practice/transforming-tomorrow-podcast/transcripts/
Send your questions on any of the issues we discuss in Transforming Tomorrow to [email protected] or fill in our feedback form here: https://forms.office.com/e/7Bw4rDiRDt
Find out more about the Pentland Centre and its work here: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/pentland/
Meet the Hosts
Professor Jan Bebbington is the Director of the Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business at Lancaster University. Jan is an expert on accounting, benchmarking (to her co-host’s annoyance), and how business and sustainability intersect.
Jan loves nature and wants to protect it – and hopes she can change the world (ideally for the better). She is also motivated to address inequality wherever it is found and especially to eliminate forced, bonded or child labour. Transforming Tomorrow is one small step on that quest.
Paul Turner is a former sports journalist who now works promoting the research activities in Lancaster University Management School – a poacher turned gamekeeper as his former colleagues would have it.
Paul has always been interested in nature and the natural environment – it comes from growing up in Cumbria – and has been a vocal proponent of the work of the Pentland Centre since joining Lancaster University. He does not like rankings and benchmarking, and is not afraid to say so.