Journal of Cleaner Production 181 (2018) 473e482

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Journal of Cleaner Production

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Sustainability at universities: Students’ perceptions from Green and

Non-Green universities

te_ *, Genovaite_ Liobikiene,
Renata Dagiliu _ Audrone_ Minelgaite_
Vytautas Magnus University, Vileikos st. 8-223, LT-44404, Kaunas, Lithuania

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: As institutions of higher education, universities have a significant impact on society and can play a key
Available online 3 February 2018 role in sustainability provision. Particularly, it is expected that green universities, because they are
becoming more widespread, would contribute to the sustainability performance the most. However,
Keywords: none of the case studies have analysed the differences in sustainability performance between the “green”
Sustainable development and the “non-green” universities from the perspective of the students. Therefore, the objective of this
Green university
study was to contribute to this topic and compare students' attitudes towards sustainability in Vytautas
Higher education
Magnus University (a non-green university) and Kaunas University of Technology (a green university).
Attitudes of students
Participation
According to a survey conducted in 2015, the differences in campus sustainability, environmental in-
formation, the university's role in sustainable development, students' attitudes to the university's self-
presentation as green, and students' involvement in sustainability in these two universities were ana-
lysed. Results indicate that there were no significant differences regarding sustainability aspects in
general, but green university students more often agree that their university presents itself as envi-
ronmentally friendly. They get more environmental information and more often participate in sustain-
ability activities compared with students from the non-green university. After applying the regression
analysis, it was found that only campus sustainability and environmental information determined stu-
dents' involvement in sustainability significantly. This suggests that official declarations and commit-
ments should be realised in particular activities on campus and via information campaigns to contribute
to sustainability provisions in a more holistic manner. Otherwise, commitments will remain as state-
ments only.
© 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction personality with certain provisions, in this case, sustainability, and

be an example to other institutions. Thus, the importance of uni-
The specific (educational) mission of universities in society versities as such and their future transformations for the creation of
implies a very important role for them in the provision of sus- sustainable society are acknowledged and envisioned (Beynaghi
tainability (Yuan et al., 2013). Universities contribute to sustain- et al., 2016).
ability by internal (i.e., sustainability policy, campus sustainability, The vast number of international declarations (Lozano and
environmental initiatives, curricula, and research) and external Young, 2013; Lozano et al., 2015) and initiatives (e.g., Higher Edu-
(i.e., universities' role in the region) performances (Dagiliu
te_ and cation Sustainability Initiative, Principles for Responsible Manage-
Liobikiene,_ 2015). Therefore, universities are expected to engage ment Education) regarding sustainability and higher education
in sustainability both internally (i.e., as an organization) and were launched since sustainable development became part of the
externally (i.e., as an agent in the region). As organizations, uni- agenda. The role of universities in sustainability performance was
versities contribute most to the student's personal identity, especially emphasized during the decade of UNESCO Education for
worldview, and values. By compiling and formulating appropriate Sustainable Development (2005e2014). Sustainability aspects
curricula and course plans, the university can shape student became important determinants even for university rankings (e.g.,
UO green metric). Particularly, it is expected that the green uni-
versities, as institutions, will contribute to the sustainability the
* Corresponding author. most (Yuan et al., 2013). Lozano et al. (2015) indicated that

te).
E-mail address: [email protected] (R. Dagiliu _ committed (e.g., signed charters, initiatives, declarations)

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2018.01.213
0959-6526/© 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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te_ et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 181 (2018) 473e482
R. Dagiliu

universities tend to engage more in the implementation of sus- understood as transformational stages towards organizational
tainable development in comparison to uncommitted ones. Yuan culture embedding sustainable development principles (Adams
et al. (2013) investigated the awareness of faculty, alumni and et al., 2018). This shift in a sustainability culture among diverse
student's parents on sustainable development and their percep- actors within universities is one of the prerequisites for university
tions on the Green University in China. However, it has not been community engagement in sustainability (Too and Bajracharya,
widely analysed yet whether green universities really contribute to 2015).
sustainability performance more than conventional universities do. Analysed aspects of university sustainability vary greatly, but
The declaration that a university is green might remain at this level, the importance for society is widely acknowledged. Discussing the
not making any efforts for greening the campus or including more role of universities and their stronger engagement in capacity
environmental disciplines in the curriculum. As Nejati and Nejati building for local stakeholders (governmental, non-governmental,
(2013) stated, signing international declarations and committing business, communities). Turan et al. (2016) stated that stake-
to international policies might not be enough. holders have varying opinions regarding sustainable development
Students are one of the biggest groups of stakeholders at uni- in universities. Shiel et al. (2016) suggested that external (i.e., not
versities and could make a significant impact on sustainability. only within the university) capacity building for sustainable
Furthermore, they express a willingness to contribute to and sup- development is of importance, especially in the initial stages. Peer
port the sustainability of campuses and beyond (Emanuel and and Stoeglehner (2013) also highlighted universities as “change
Adams, 2011). In addition, a large number of studies have ana- agents” for the joint society-university generation of knowledge,
lysed the determinants of pro-environmental student behaviour using universities as platforms for collaboration and networking, as
(e.g., Vincente-Molino et al., 2013; Cotton et al., 2016; Rodríguez- Yarime et al. (2012) suggest. Authors see this as an enabling factor
Barreiro et al., 2013; Ting and Cheng, 2017). However, these for “learning and innovation for sustainability” (Yarime et al., 2012,
studies do not include the role of universities in curriculum or p. 111). The collaboration of higher education institutions for inte-
campus sustainability. Relatively few studies speak in greater detail gration of sustainable development provisions is also a crucial
about the involvement of students in policy formation and imple- factor in fostering sustainability (Anand et al., 2015). The role of
mentation regarding sustainability. In general, research on the in- networks could be of importance engaging universities in debates
fluence of green (i.e., committed) and non-green (i.e., non- on topics relevant to society and obliging them to fulfil their
committed) universities in sustainability activities from students’ commitments concerning sustainability (Dlouh a et al., 2018).
perceptions is undeveloped. Many more studies address the internal role of universities. This
Therefore, the objective of this study is to compare the attitudes includes universities’ commitment to sustainability overall (Lee
of students considering university sustainability and possibilities to et al., 2013), campus sustainability, and greening (Brinkhurst
act in a sustainable manner in two universities in Lithuania: Kaunas et al., 2011; Geng et al., 2013), sustainability in curriculum
University of Technology (KTU), which presents itself as a green (Lozano and Young, 2013); the role of participation in sustainability
university and Vytautas Magnus University (VMU). To compare the (Disterheft et al., 2012); and academic staff engagement in Educa-
universities, the survey was conducted, and differences in the tion for Sustainable Development (Cebrian et al., 2015; Pandey
scores of the campus sustainability, environmental information, et al., 2016). Campus sustainability usually includes construction
and the university's role in sustainable development between and refurbishment, energy consumption (e.g., see Huo and Yu,
green and non-green universities were tested. Some background 2017; Yoshida et al., 2017), water consumption, waste manage-
factors were analysed as well. The influence of different de- ment, and transport issues (Velazquez et al., 2006; Dagiliu
te_ and
terminants on students' sustainability involvement was assessed by _ 2015; Cupido et al., 2016; Adams et al., 2018), as well
Liobikiene,
applying regression analysis. as products and services purchasing practices (Pacheco-Blanco and
Thus, the paper proceeds as follows. First, a short literature re- Bastante-Ceca, 2016; Adams et al., 2018). Focusing only on some
view to ground the approach applied is present. Afterwards, the aspects of campus operations has received some critique. As pro-
results of students’ activities and their perceptions towards the posed by Posner and Stuart (2013), universities should develop a
university role in sustainability followed by the factors influencing systemic approach to sustainability. Universities that apply sus-
their involvement in sustainability are discussed. The paper is tainability principles not only in operational activities, but also
finalized with a discussion and closing remarks. cover research, education, and outreach, are considered sustainable
or greener (Velazquez et al., 2006; Tan et al., 2014).
2. University contributions to sustainable development, Authors also indicate that declared commitments should be
students’ perceptions of university sustainability, and the expressed in the curriculum content (Green, 2013) and learning
importance of participation outcomes (Mintz and Tal, 2013) to have effects on students' per-
ceptions and behaviour. Studies by Zso  ka et al. (2013), Vicente-
Research works, particularly regarding university contributions Mollino et al. (2013), Dagiliu
te_ and Niaura (2014), and Dagiliu
te_
to sustainability, has become a subject of study in recent decades. A and Liobikiene_ (2015) confirm that particular curricula contribute
university's role in sustainability encompasses the whole spectrum to the environmental knowledge and promotion of students'
of aspects starting with the university's mission, education and environmental awareness, which are the main drivers of environ-
research, administration, and external stakeholders (Koscielniak, mentally friendly behaviour (e.g., it has been suggested that raising
2014). This means “the whole system approach” (Koester et al., awareness could contribute to the reduction of students' carbon
2006) must be applied while seeking efficient contributions of footprint (Li et al., 2015)). Among other factors of green (i.e., sus-
higher education to sustainability, covering management of the tainable) student behaviour is gender, attitudes, and influence of
university, public participation and social responsibility, curricular the parents or peers. Zhang et al. (2017) present that the following
sustainability, and research at the same time (Alshuwaikhat and groups engage in waste sorting activities in Beijing universities
Abubakar, 2008). Particularly Green Universities should incorpo- more often: female students, those who are willing to act, those
rate sustainability into campus activities, such as teaching, having friends who separate waste, and those having better per-
research, facility operation and infrastructure construction (Yuan ceptions of the university's waste management processes.
et al., 2013). The sustainability of universities could be Studies on students' perceptions about sustainability usually

te_ et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 181 (2018) 473e482
R. Dagiliu 475

focus on their general perceptions regarding climate change and 3. Methods

personal responsibility (Eagle et al., 2015). Though students could
provide innovative ideas or suggest and contribute to the im- 3.1. Applied conceptual model
provements in terms of current performance of universities, studies
on students' perception towards a university's contribution to Based on the literature review and covered sustainability as-
sustainability are under-researched. Abd-Razaka et al. (2011) pects, the conceptual framework was developed (Fig. 1.) to answer
discuss campus development planning based on students' per- the following main study questions from the students' (one of the
ceptions. They found that students indicated “weak” areas (e.g., university stakeholders) point of view: 1) what are the main points
accessibility, improper lighting, and safety) on university cam- of sustainability in universities; 2) whether committed universities
puses; this could help to improve campus sustainability. Moreover, express their sustainability commitments, in reality, more effec-
Nejati and Nejati (2013) explored universities' sustainability prac- tively than non-committed ones, and 3) how this influences stu-
tices from the perspective of students. Based on students' percep- dents' involvement in sustainability (which is considered as
tions, they suggest considering four constructs for measuring important factor (Brinkhurst et al., 2011; Disterheft et al., 2012)).
university sustainability practices: community outreach, sustain- The latter might be determined by such important aspects as the
ability commitment and monitoring, waste and energy, and land university campus (Alshuwaikhat and Abubakar, 2008; Yuan et al.,
use and planning. Analysing students' priorities for sustainable 2013; Yoshida et al., 2017; Adams et al., 2018; etc.), information
development in higher education, Yuan and Zuo (2013) highlighted provision, including curricular (Zso ka et al., 2013) and communi-
that environmental aspects were dominant. As their study showed, cation (Brinkhurst et al., 2011; Timothy et al., 2015), self-
students' possibilities to act in sustainable ways and sustainability- representation as a green university, student attitudes towards
related research were also perceived as principal factors while universities’ role in sustainability (Yuan and Zuo, 2013), and some
giving the least significance to sustainable curricula. In turn, stu- socioeconomic factors (Cotton et al., 2016; Zhang et al., 2017; Ting
dent participation in social transformation towards carbon and Cheng, 2017). To reveal the influence of official commitments
neutrality was seen as very beneficial (Rosenberg Daneri et al., (committed/uncommitted) (Yuan et al., 2013; Nejati and Nejati,
2015; Trencher et al., 2015). 2013; Lozano et al., 2015) regarding real performance, the univer-
In addition, involvement and participation in university life and sity variable is of importance in the study, as well. One might expect
related decisions form one of the main prerequisites for successful that students from a “committed” university representing itself as
education concerning sustainability. While presenting a model for green would have more possibilities to express sustainability on the
sustainability assessment in higher education, Disterheft et al. campus, receive more relevant information, and see more roles the
(2016) exhibited the importance of participatory and collabora- university takes in sustainability. The model was tested using sur-
tive approaches, facilitation, and communication. Thus, incorpo- vey data (next subsection).
ration of the whole university community, students included, in the
sustainability activities enables ownership, responsibility, and real
impact. Leo n-Fernandez et al. (2018) concluded comparable results 3.2. Survey approach
in the case of development of environmental strategy and policy at
the University of Co rdoba using a participatory approach. Oppo- Based on students' subjective perceptions, the sustainability of
sitely, Velazquez et al. (2005) indicated a lack of participation and two universities in Lithuania (KTU and VMU) is compared in this
involvement as a deterring factor for sustainability in higher edu- paper. Green (greener) or sustainable (more sustainable) university
cation institutions. Hence, bottom-up initiatives, especially as presented in the literature review is considered the one taking
student-led ones, could be important drivers for change in uni- into consideration sustainability aspects throughout all activities of
versity policy and operation (Brinkhurst et al., 2011). university: university's mission, teaching, research, facility opera-
However, the inclusion of the whole community in tion and infrastructure, management of the university, public
sustainability-related decision-making or activities is limited participation (Alshuwaikhat and Abubakar, 2008; Yuan et al., 2013;
because of a rather stagnant institutional structure and poor Koscielniak, 2014; Tan et al., 2014). Some authors group universities
engagement for sustainability of administrative staff (Avila et al., into committed and uncommitted categories according to their
2017) but even more, because there is a lack of information or participation in different official activities (e.g., signing official
limited access to information and data in the institution. Brinkhurst
et al. (2011) suggested that clear communication and assessment of
sustainable initiatives could strengthen an overall commitment to
change. In addition, universities could act as channels for dissem-
ination of information and building dialogues with various stake-
holders via different Internet tools and resources (Katiliute and
Daunoriene, 2015). However, universities miss even web-based
opportunities to deliver the sustainability message in terms of
their study programmes for future students (Timothy et al., 2015).
Hence, research in the field varies a great deal, and the whole
spectrum of areas related to sustainability could be addressed. In
general, university contributions to sustainability were reviewed
not only in this but also in previous study of Dagiliu
te_ and
Liobikiene_ (2015). However, studies regarding students’ percep-
tions of university sustainability and environmental information
provision at the university are less addressed, as only scarce and
fragmented data was available, especially regarding green (i.e.,
committed) and non-green (i.e., uncommitted) universities.
Therefore, the existing gap might be filled by research reported in
this paper. Fig. 1. Study approach model.
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R. Dagiliu

declarations, joining international organizations and initiatives) Table 1

(Lozano et al., 2015). This study has chosen to classify universities The demographic characteristics of the survey.

by taking two of the aspects into account 1) commitment (via the Variable VMU KTU
content analysis of strategic documents) and 2) self- Gender
representation/communication campaign. A content analysis of Female 78.3% 62.7%
strategic documents study by Minelgaite_ and Dagiliu
te_ (2015) in- Male 21.7% 37.3%
dicates a higher commitment to sustainability by KTU than by VMU. Age
<18 0.0% 0.0%
The study was looking for the keywords related to the sustainable
18-20 17.3% 28.4%
development in the mission, vision, priorities, principles, and 21-22 45.9% 40.1%
values of each Lithuanian university. Analysis showed KTU 23-25 23.6% 20.4%
commitment to sustainability to be higher (scored 3 out of 4) than >25 13.1% 11.1%
Education
VMU (1 out of 4). Considering the self -representation/communi-
Bachelor's 72% 74.7%
cation campaigns, KTU has been chosen as a green (i.e., committed) Master's 28% 25.3%
university because it declares this position within its strategic ac- Faculties
tions (Strategic action plan for 2014e2016) and public communi- Natural sciences (and related) 15.2% 21.9%
cation and VMU has been chosen as a non-green university because Humanities, social sciences, arts (and related) 69.1% 15.9%
Economics (and related) 12.6% 31.3%
there is no official position on the matter. In addition, KTU uses the
Engineering (and related) No department 11.1%
“green university” notion and the specific logo widely in their Informatics (and related) 3.14% 19.8%
communication and was awarded for the campaign with the same
title in 2015. Under this title, various continual activities (e.g., en-
ergy saving, waste sorting in general, and ones in line with Euro-
3.3. Survey assessment and statistical analysis
pean week for waste reduction) are organized and communicated
on the Internet and social media. While none of the Lithuanian
The questionnaire is comprised of four main constructs: i)
universities was in the GreenMetric rankings (2016) in 2015, KTU
campus sustainability, which reveals the possibilities for students
holds the Quality System of Science and Technology Universities for
to behave in a more environmentally friendly mode at the univer-
Sustainable Industry (QUESTE-SI) accreditation. Despite KTU being
sity; ii) environmental information, which shows the possibilities
more technology-orientated and VMU focusing more on human-
of obtaining environmental information within the university (e.g.,
ities and social sciences, both universities are dominant in the city
university website, documents, and lectures); iii) university's role
offering a wide range of study programmes in nearly the same
in sustainable development, which reveals important aspects
study areas. In addition, buildings of both universities are dispersed
regarding a sustainable university; and iv) student involvement in
across the city and in some cases, share close neighbourhoods. It
sustainability (i.e., student participation in the environmental ac-
has to be admitted that some bias of classification applied might
tivities at the university). The scales for constructs of campus sus-
remain, as not all university sustainability aspects are compared
tainability and the university's role in sustainable development
and taken into account as suggested by literature review. However,
were created referring to the areas of sustainability at the univer-
aspects considered serve as a reasonable background for applied
sity covered in the literature review as well as environmental in-
classification of chosen universities.
formation, considering all sources where students might obtain
Analysis was based on the results of questionnaire data. The
information regarding the university's position on environmental
survey was carried out from February to March, 2015. The ques-
objectives. The scale of students' involvement in sustainability was
tionnaire was created on the survey platform. First, to improve and
constructed referring to the literature review and taking into
refine the instrument, the pilot survey was carried out among a
consideration the current situation of sustainability in higher ed-
group of VMU students taking the same course. Afterwards, using
ucation in Lithuania. Only two similar studies referring to the stu-
random convenience-sampling VMU and KTU students were
dents' perceptions of sustainability in higher education (Nejati and
approached electronically to take part in the survey. Of VMU stu-
Nejati, 2013; Yuan and Zuo, 2013) were carried out by building
dents, 389 agreed to take part as did 415 students from KTU. In
some of the constructs.
total, 804 anonymous questionnaires were completed. As of 2015
The factor analysis was applied to examine properties of campus
data, 7709 students studied at VMU and 10495 at KTU. Krejcie and
sustainability, environmental information, students' involvement
Morgans (1970) suggested a simple size formula; according to this,
in sustainability, and the university's role in sustainable develop-
the number of students surveyed was sufficient.
ment. Table 2 shows that all factor loadings exceeded 0.4 (Hair
The demographic composition of the samples is shown in
et al., 1998). The internal consistency of the scale was determined
Table 1. Though the female share in our research is larger, gender
using Cronbach's alpha. The reliability estimates of scaled items
distribution follows general trends in Lithuanian universities,
ranged from 0.51 to 0.84. The reliability of campus sustainability
where females compose 58.2% of students (Lithuanian statistics,
and environmental information were rather low; however, these
2016). Among the respondents from VMU, 78.3% were female,
constructs were used because they are among the main indicators
and 21.7% were male. Meanwhile, from KTU, 62.7% were female and
of being a green university. The full list of items of the scales and
37.3% male. The largest share of respondents in both universities
separate questions included in the scales is presented in Table 2.
consisted of students from bachelor study programmes. Due to a
Answer options to questions in the survey consisted of 4-point
large variety of faculties in both universities, faculties were grouped
Likert scales from 1 (do not agree absolutely) to 4 (agree
according to their main area. Despite some bias due to the sampling
absolutely).
and grouping of the faculties, distribution over study areas is rather
To compare campus sustainability, environmental information,
representative. The majority of the students at VMU studied in the
student attitudes towards the university's role in sustainable
departments of political science, social sciences, law, humanities,
development, and students' involvement in sustainability between
arts, and music academy (70%), in the faculty of economy and
KTU and VMU, a t-test was used. Chi-square was used to test dif-
management (22%), in the faculty of natural sciences (8%), and in
ferences in the scores of the students' involvement in sustainability
informatics and mathematics (4%). KTU is dominated by technol-
via analysis of socio-demographic variables.
ogies, engineering and informatics-related students (~81%).

te_ et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 181 (2018) 473e482
R. Dagiliu 477

Table 2
Mean and standard deviation of the scale items.

Scale Mean SD Factor Cronbach's

Loading Alpha

Campus sustainability
University has active environmental student organization(s) 2.42 0.71 0.716 0.629
University encourages use of public transport, bikes 2.40 0.71 0.56
There is a possibility to recycle waste at the university 2.66 0.63 0.574
There is a possibility to use one's own non-disposable cup for coffee 1.97 0.92 0.709

Environmental information
I have read strategic documents of the university and their implementation reports 1.44 0.69 0.43 0.51
I receive the majority of environmental and sustainability-related information during lectures 1.80 0.74 0.869
University website presents a lot of information regarding university's position on environmental objectives 2.17 0.71 0.40

Students' sustainability involvement

I take part in environmental activities organized by the university 1.51 0.69 0.786 0.74
I take part in social activities organized by the university 1.73 0.74 0.794
I am actively involved in activities at the university 1.78 0.72 0.771

University's role in sustainable development

University contributes to energy and resource saving 2.71 0.56 0.793 0.84
University contributes to social well-being, tolerance (e.g., gender, race, religion equality), fulfilment of needs of the disabled, 2.81 0.51 0.822
social activities
University contributes to environmental education, ecology, environmental activities 2.73 0.54 0.831
University cooperates with other national and foreign universities and businesses 2.77 0.53 0.804
University contributes to inclusion of sustainability aspects in study programmes 2.56 0.63 0.679
University promotes sustainability research 2.67 0.56 0.764

University's self-representation as a green university

University represents itself as environmentally friendly and clearly declares environmental objectives 2.58 0.60

Finally, a generalized linear regression model was applied to universities, results showed that significant differences were
evaluate the main direct determinants of students' involvement in observed only in terms of sorting waste (t ¼ 2.71, p ¼ 0.007), indi-
sustainability. It included determinants such as campus sustain- cating a better situation at KTU. Considering transport, the opposite
ability, environmental information, the university's role in sus- situation was observeddthe usage of public transport or a bike is
tainable development, attitudes to university's self-presentation as promoted at VMU more than at KTU. However, this difference was
green, as well as variables of gender and university. non-significant (t ¼ 1.41, p ¼ 0.16). Comparing the overall level of
campus sustainability, no statistically significant difference be-
tween the two universities was observed (t ¼ 0.25, p ¼ 0.8) (Fig. 3).
4. Results These results suggest that green and non-green universities
might differ only by official declaration within policy documents
4.1. University's role in sustainable development and campus and communication campaigns. Nevertheless, it should be
sustainability admitted that greening of universities is rather a new phenomenon
in Lithuania. Therefore, different activities and projects might only
Universities as higher education institutions play a very be at the initial stages and have not reached the students broadly
important role in sustainability provision. By compiling and yet.
formulating appropriate curricula and course plans, the university
can shape students' personalities with certain provisions, in this
case, sustainability. However, regarding students' attitudes about 4.2. Environmental information and attitude towards a university's
the university's role in sustainable development, the results of the self-presentation as green
survey in both universities showed that students consider social
aspects to be the most important for a sustainable university. The Analysing student attitudes to a university's self-presentation as
environmental aspects, such as energy saving, environmental ed- green, the results showed that students from KTU, which officially
ucation, and actions are less important. In addition, students agreed presents itself as a green university, more often agree that their
the least that for a sustainable university it is important to include university presents itself as environmentally friendly compared to
the sustainable development aspects of the study programmes VMU students (t ¼ 5.26, p < 0.001). Hence, KTU clearly communi-
(Fig. 2). Comparing the university's overall role in sustainable cates being green for their students. Students get most of the in-
development and its aspects between green and non-green uni- formation about the university's position regarding the
versities, no significant differences were observed (t ¼ 0.34, environment from the university's website, particularly the stu-
p ¼ 0.74). This could support the idea that all aspects of sustain- dents from KTU (t ¼ 5.38, p < 0.001). Meanwhile, the fewest stu-
ability are of importance for students and that despite their ach- dents read strategic documents where the university's position on
ieved results and positioning, universities should pay more the environment and sustainability is usually presented (Fig. 4).
attention to sustainability in general. During the curriculum process, students indicated obtaining
Campus sustainability is one part of the internal practices and less information about the environment and sustainable develop-
activities the universities contribute to sustainability. Analysing the ment in comparison to other means of information dissemination
campus sustainability from students' perspectives, the results (except strategic documents). Thus, inefficient curriculum
revealed that sorting waste in universities is the easiest to achieve. employment for information and knowledge dissemination re-
Meanwhile, the largest problem is to have coffee or tea in one's own mains the main problem for universities (i.e., only 19.3% of students
non-disposable cup. Comparing green (KTU) and non-green (VMU) said they gained enough information about sustainable
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R. Dagiliu

2.9
KTU
2.8
VDU
2.7
Mean

2.6

2.5

2.4

2.3
Saving of energy Social welfare Environmental Collabora on SD in SD research Overall
educa on curriculum university role
in SD

Error bars indicate standard error of the mean

Fig. 2. Aspects important for a sustainable university.

3 *
KTU
2.5 VMU

2
Mean

1.5

0.5

0
Environmental Public trasport Recycling Own cup Campus
organiza on sustainability

Error bars indicate standard error of the mean

Fig. 3. Campus sustainability aspects at universities (*p < 0.05).

development during their lectures). However, comparing two 4.3. Students’ involvement in sustainability and its determinants
universities, VMU students gain more information about the
environment and sustainable development than KTU students do Analysis of the students’ involvement in sustainability indicates
during their studies. Hence, despite that this difference is insig- that 39.2% of students feel insufficiently involved in various activ-
nificant (t ¼ 1.18, p ¼ 0.24) (Fig. 4), there should be more or wider ities and university planning. Nevertheless, most students know
sustainable development aspects included in the curriculum of the about their university-based initiatives and active student organi-
green university (KTU) to reach more students. zations but are not inclined to participate in social or environ-
Nevertheless, KTU students gained more overall information mental campaigns organized by the university. Only 11.1% of
about the environment in comparison to VMU students (t ¼ 3.51, students take part in environmental activities. Younger students
p < 0.001) (Fig. 4). This result reveals that the university, which (c2 ¼ 22.13, p < 0.05) and students from engineering and natural
officially declares itself as green, disseminates more environmental science-related faculties (c2 ¼ 38.89, p < 0.05) are more active.
information and consequently students gain more knowledge Comparing both universities, the students from KTU declared that
about the environment. This way, they can be influenced to behave they more often participated in environmental activities at uni-
in an environmentally friendly mode, even considering that they versity in contrast to the students from VMU (t ¼ 3.58, p < 0.001).
gain less corresponding information during the lectures. Overall, involvement in sustainability was also higher at KTU
(t ¼ 3.15, p < 0.05).

te_ et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 181 (2018) 473e482
R. Dagiliu 479

2.5
KTU *
VMU
2 *

*
1.5
Mean

0.5

0
Strategy documents Curricula Website Environmental
informa on

Error bars indicate standard error of the mean

Fig. 4. Environmental information in universities (*p < 0.05).

To evaluate the main determinants of students' involvement in driven by those commitments still might be in the initial phase and
sustainability, a regression analysis was carried out based on the need time to be fully implemented to show considerable influence
conceptual framework. It revealed that independent variables ac- regarding students' involvement in sustainability in terms of Lith-
count for 28% of the variance (adjusted R2). Table 3 presents un- uanian green universities.
standardized regression coefficients for each independent variable
entered into the model. The results significantly showed that
campus sustainability and environmental information determined 5. Discussion and recommendations
students' involvement in sustainability at the universities
(p < 0.05). Meanwhile, gender, university commitment, attitudes In general, as institutions of higher education, universities have
towards the university's self-presentation as green, and the uni- a significant impact on sustainability provisions. The phenomenon
versity's role in sustainable development had an insignificant of the green university is becoming more prevalent. However, it is
impact. very important that being green not be in declaration only. So far,
In addition, results reveal that the most important determinants this topic is under-researched. Thus, in this paper, campus sus-
are environmental information and university campus sustain- tainability, environmental information, student attitudes about
ability, but not the declaration as a green university as was ex- universities' self-presentation as green, university's role in sus-
pected. Hence, committed universities should engage in tainable development, and students' involvement in sustainability
sustainability provisions in a more holistic manner within all the between green and non-green universities were analysed and
spheres of university life (i.e., include students more actively in the compared taking the students' perspective. The comparison of the
university activities), provide information and real-life examples constructs was based on the built scales for measurement.
instead of only directly following guidelines on inclusion of sus- Both universities under analysis are mainly at the same level
tainability topics into curriculum, which appeared not to be a sig- engaging sustainability issues, but there are some key differences
nificant aspect for students. In addition, only official commitments which could be of importance and should be considered. The re-
(e.g., signing declarations, charters, and joining official initiatives) sults showed that students from the green university (KTU) more
might not be a decisive factor for students’ involvement and often agree that their university represents itself as environmen-
environmental behaviour, as they usually do not read those docu- tally friendly. In addition, they gain more environmental informa-
ments and value sustainability from their own daily experiences at tion, and the main source of it remains the university's website.
university. This suggests that the university website could be employed more
Still, some influence of the university's commitment could be and enabled so that universities could act as channels for dissem-
seen (B ¼ 0.15, p < 0.1) suggesting that sustainability initiatives ination of information and building dialogues with different
stakeholders (Katiliute and Daunoriene, 2015), not just students.

Table 3
Regression model for students’ environmental/sustainability involvement.

Parameter B Std. Error Wald Chi-Square Sig.

(Intercept) 0.76 0.269 7.89 0.01

(University ¼ KTU) compared with VMU 0.15 0.09 3.34 0.07
(Gender ¼ female) compared with male 0.04 0.08 0.22 0.64
Environmental information 0.42 0.08 27.15 < 0.001
Campus sustainability 0.34 0.09 14.22 < 0.001
Attitudes towards university's presentation as the green 0.09 0.08 1.18 0.28
University's role in sustainable development 0.13 0.09 1.93 0.17

N ¼ 798, adjusted R2 ¼ 0.284, deviance value/df ¼ 0.279; bold values p < 0.05.
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R. Dagiliu

Results also highlight that despite this, one of the primary areas universities' level of greenness from the students' perspective. In
where universities might act is curriculum; during the curriculum addition, results confirmed that students from a committed uni-
process, students did not gain enough information about sustain- versity more often participate in environmental activities in
ability. Moreover, during their lectures, students got more infor- contrast to the students from uncommitted ones. These results
mation about the environment in the non-green university. could be influenced by the universities' profiles, the first being
Therefore, these results show that the green university does not more technology-orientated, the second related more to human-
take full advantage of the curriculum process. ities. Their overall evaluation of constructs of sustainability
Though the overall environmental information construct was of involvement was higher, suggesting that a “committed” university
higher importance in the green university, curriculum importance involves students more in sustainability.
should not be neglected. Taking into account that sustainable The proposed conceptual framework reveals not only student
development encompasses the main aspects of society (i.e., envi- attitudes towards sustainability, but also explores key factors
ronment, economy, social life), it fits for all study programmes. The behind their involvement. This study shows that student involve-
curriculum does have an impact on environmental concern and ment in sustainability is determined significantly only by campus
responsibility, which in turn influence environmental behaviour sustainability and environmental information. Though some au-
(Dagiliu
te_ and Liobikiene, _ 2015). According to Yuan and Zuo (2013), thors (Zhang et al., 2017) suggest gender to be an influential factor
75.3% of students agree or strongly agree on a separate course for some environmental behaviour, the gender factor was not
concerning sustainability. However, universities miss even web- influential in our case. In addition, variables such as the commit-
based opportunities to deliver the message of sustainability in ment of the university to sustainability, perceptions on the uni-
terms of their study programmes for future students (Timothy et al., versity's role in sustainable development and attitudes about a
2015). For current students, Carpenter et al. (2016) suggest not university's self-presentation as green had an insignificant impact.
relying solely on web communications, but rather use a more dia- Though some research (Lozano et al., 2015) indicates that
logic communication approach to have better results in committed (e.g., signed charters, initiatives, declarations) univer-
sustainability. sities tend to engage in sustainable development implementation
Campus sustainability is another important approach in seeking more in comparison to non-committed ones, results of this study
overall environmental sustainability (Geng et al., 2013). Univer- suggest that commitment itself might not necessarily lead to the
sities should propose internal possibilities to behave in a more sustainability of the university and should be considered with more
environmentally friendly mode. However, comparing campus sus- caution. These insights are in line with the ideas of Nejati and Nejati
tainability, no statistically significant difference between the green (2013), stating that signing international declarations and
and non-green universities was observed in this study. Neverthe- committing to international policies “would not be comprehensive
less, it should be admitted that greening of the universities is a enough” (p. 105). Information provision and campus sustainability
rather new phenomenon in Lithuania and campus sustainability might be the aspects that indicate sustainability from the students'
might be only in the initial stages; therefore, it has not yet reached perspective and could influence their behaviour more than official
the students broadly despite the commitment by the university. declarations. Avila et al. (2017) also stress the need for involvement
This might be a common feature for post-socialist countries, which of the academic community as a crucial factor to overcome sus-
have undergone a transition in all areas of life (Juknys et al., 2008) tainability barriers in higher institution, but for that, a rise in
including transformative processes in higher education (Dlouha . awareness of both staff and students is needed. In addition, as
et al., 2017). However, for future perspectives, universities which Adams et al. (2018) state, desired behaviours might remain enacted
declare themselves as green should invest more in campus sus- because of infrastructural or other factors that limit them from
tainability by encompassing the programs of energy saving, waste being realised. Therefore, the created environment (infrastructure)
management, food services, etc., especially behavioural shaping, together with information provision and awareness raising could
that reaches students directly and enables them to act sustainably. enable students to act in a more sustainable way and to achieve
From the students' point of view, for the university's role in meaningful results in seeking sustainability.
sustainable development, social welfare (tolerance and needs of
disabled students) is the most important factor. Students agree the 6. Limitations and future directions
least that it is important to include sustainable development as-
pects in curricula, though they admitted receiving rather limited In this paper, the curriculum sustainability, environmental in-
information during the study process. This observation is in line formation, and the university's role in sustainable development
with the study by Yuan and Zuo (2013), indicating sustainable between green/committed and non-green/non-committed uni-
curricula occupied the least ranking position. However, in their versities are compared, and the determinants of students'
study, environmental sustainability was given priority over social involvement in sustainability are analysed. However, several limi-
responsibility, though the latter dominated in our study. tations need to be acknowledged. First, the reliabilities of the
In turn, comparing the university's overall role in sustainable following constructsdcampus sustainability and environmental
development between the green and non-green universities, some informationdare rather low. As these scales tend to influence
insignificant differences were observed. Likewise, campus sus- student involvement in sustainability the most, they should be
tainability, the university's role in sustainable development, expanded more by including additional items and encompassing
revealed that KTUdone of the first green universities in Lith- additional spheres. Moreover, it would be more suitable to use a
uaniadis in the initial stages. To make sure the university would five-point or seven-point Likert scale for interpretation and com-
not be green in declaration only, more efforts and investments are parison of the results instead of a four-point Likert scale. In addi-
needed. Active participation in the various networks for higher tion, the constructs are based on the literature review. Despite that
education institutions or sustainable development could be a driver there are a number of tools and guidelines for sustainability
for this, as Dlouha  et al. (2018, p. 4273) suggest, because networks assessment (Lozano, 2006), other studies also focus on adaptation
are “creating an environment in which universities are obliged to of existing tools and existing studies while building their constructs
fulfil their sustainability commitments”. In addition, findings show (e.g., Yuan and Zuo (2013) based their study on Graphical Assess-
that constructs of campus sustainability and the university's role in ment of Sustainability in Universities, still adapting it to their
sustainable development might be useful indicators to evaluate the needs) while Nejati and Nejati (2013) grounded their research in

te_ et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 181 (2018) 473e482
R. Dagiliu 481

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