Since 2010, our annual research has found that around 80 per cent of students want their institutions to be doing more on sustainability, and around 60 per cent want to learn more about it.

Each year we ask students about their attitudes towards learning for sustainable development. We know that students care about sustainability. We see it from the actions thousands are taking on their campuses and in their communities.

This research makes it even more clear how much students care about sustainability:

• Approximately 80 per cent of students want their institution to be doing more on sustainable development
• Around 60 per cent of students want to learn more about sustainability

We’ve conducted this research since 2010-11, and these results have remained constant; despite changes such as the rise in fees, and the crash of the jobs market, the demand for action by their institutions and desire to learn about sustainability has remained constant.

From 2010-11 to 2015-15 the research was funded by the Higher Education Academy (now Advance HE) and was focused on students in higher education across the UK. Since 2015-16, we’ve included students in further education (FE) in our research. We found that FE students agreed with those in HE - that sustainability is important both during their time in education and beyond into employment.

Research like this is part of the reason we do the sustainability work we do. It’s important to students, so it’s important to us – and we’ll continue to embed sustainability across campuses, curriculums and communities because that’s what students want.

Reports from 2016-17 onwards are available. If you wish to access older reports, please contact research@sos-uk.org

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