Abstract:

In 2015, 193 countries members of the United Nations adopted a new global policy: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (ASD), which aims to raise world development and enhance the quality of life for all people. To this end, 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and 169 targets were established, which were proposed to be achieved through a joint action that brings together different levels of government, organizations, companies and society at the international, national and local levels.

Among the established SDGs, on the one hand, SDG 12 aims at addressing sustainable production and consumption, with a focus on global and local actions, such as achieving the efficient use of natural resources. Moreover, this goal also includes appropriate solid waste management and reduction of polluting emissions. In relation to solid wastes, SDG 12 can be achieved by reducing waste generation through prevention, reduction, recycling and reuse, both in consumption and in production. Thus, a proper waste management is relevant and supports the implementation of many other goals, including other SDGs.

On the other hand, SDG 4, achieving inclusive and quality education, includes not only learning about fundamental areas of humanities and science, but also encompass skills more broadly, including creativity and innovation, critical thinking/problem solving/decision making, learning to learn/metacognition, communication, collaboration (teamwork), life and career skills, and personal and social responsibility (including cultural awareness and competence). Accordingly, this abilities and attributes are taught or learned in order to enhance ways of thinking, learning, working and living in the world, so that conscious and independent future generations could be developed. Thereby, an adequate environmental education that can contribute to the proper management of wastes is essential and a priority requirement when considering the education of future generations, in line with the objectives set out in the 2030 ASD.

Therefore, the main objective of this research work is to involve students and all the university community at two Faculties integrated in the University Campus of Alava (UCA) (University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU) in the proper management of wastes (both solid and hazardous), in order to achieve the aforementioned SDGs and to raise awareness towards sustainable development. To this end, a multidisciplinary approach has been used, involving academic staff, service and administrative staff, and students, three of which have taken part actively carrying out their Bachelor's thesis. The first step has been to analyze the results obtained in a previous project, whose objective was to analyze the waste management system used at the Faculty of Engineering of Vitoria-Gasteiz (UCA, UPV/EHU), improve it, and extend it to other centers at the Campus. The conclusions drawn allowed identifying improvement opportunities and proposing awareness actions (surveys, competitions, use of social networks, etc.) to reduce the amount of waste generated and to increase selective collection at the UCA.

In conclusion, with the development of this project, progress has been made towards achieving the goals set within SDG 4 and 12, improving thereby the waste management as well as raising awareness and sensitizing the entire university community on the importance of the proper waste management in order to address an education for sustainable development.

Keywords:

Education for sustainable development, 2030 Agenda, selective waste collection, university community awareness.