CSR meets higher education: part II

One likes to think that humankind along with its creations is progressing rather than merely exploring different dimensions in an attempt to understand how we might and should live on this planet. Wouldn’t you agree? Think about universities. The first university, the university of Constantinopole, established in 425 was defined by research, teaching, academic independence and auto-administration.
Since then challenges, requirements and opportunities have multiplied and diversified. Besides cultivating brainpower, universities are now also expected to be centres for innovation, stimulate the economy and lead the “society’s efforts to achieve sustainability” (HEFCE: Sustainable development in Higher Education, 2005). Ultimately, universities should have a dual transformative role, i.e. unlocking the individual’s potential as well as improving a sense of collective wellbeing. This new vision of quality provides us with the opportunity “to demonstrate the full power and potential of higher education for the individual, for the economy, for the environment and for society” (New economics foundation: University Challenge: Towards a well-being approach to quality in higher education, 2008).
The wish list has certainly grown longer in the last 1600 years.
In terms of CSR, we live in interesting times. Just as businesses – who have been leaders in CSR – are winding down their CSR commitments in this economic downturn, universities are increasingly waking up to their CSR call. The second round of ‘Universities That Count’ benchmarking is currently taking place. Adapted from BITC’s CR index for the private sector, through the assessment exercise we now have an opportunity – for the first time in history – to understand holistically what our performance and impact as an institution is. I call this a progress. Until now, we’ve been defined by RAE (Research Assessment Exercise) and various other rankings focusing mainly on teaching and research, which, as necessary as they are, define us in a narrow way, especially in the light of this dual transformative role universities are envisaged as having.
This is a great moment for the HE sector to show leadership in CSR: as the private sector is withdrawing to their ‘quick cash-thinking’, universities as ‘higher places of learning’ can demonstrate the importance of CSR in advancing society’s development. Surely, challenges for businesses differ from those of the Higher Education sector. But maybe this is a key: our sector can provide new groundings for CSR and new innovative ways of ‘doing’ CSR through its own actions and research. Organisational development, models of self-governance, business education, behaviour change, citizenship… I hope developing CSR in the HE sector will lead to dialogue between the private and HE sector and will strengthen and broaden CSR for the whole society’s benefit and progress.

Article by Anne Raudaskoski