Following the University of Toronto (U of T) achieving first position in the QS World University Rankings: Sustainability for the second year in a row, we spoke to the University’s President, Professor Meric Gertler. What has driven this performance?
How do you ensure that sustainability remains a central part of UoT’s strategic priorities and institutional culture?
U of T’s leadership in sustainability is founded on the talent we attract and their personal commitment to this vital cause. To coordinate their efforts, we’ve created a committee with broad representation from students, faculty and staff who bring to the table an amazing range of expertise. This group – the Committee on the Environment, Climate Change and Sustainability – is doing brilliant work in every area of U of T’s mission and operations. We’ve also established offices on all three of our campuses, to promote a culture of sustainability.
How important is student and faculty engagement in achieving sustainability goals, and what steps has UoT taken to involve these groups?
A huge number of U of T students and faculty come to the university already deeply committed to sustainability. To support and amplify this talent and passion among our students and to prepare them for a lifetime of leadership in the field, we’ve established what we call the Sustainability Pathways Program. The goal is to provide all undergraduates opportunities to incorporate sustainability learning, inside and outside the classroom, regardless of their degree program. In addition, we’re engaging both students and faculty to collaborate on real-world projects through our Campus as a Living Lab and Community Engaged Learning programs.
“Governments should be engaging universities as key parts of their strategies for tacking climate change”
What have been the biggest challenges in making UoT a sustainable university, and how have you overcome them?
The U of T community includes so many students, faculty and staff who are profoundly dedicated to building a sustainable future. The challenge was to get everyone aligned and pulling in the same direction, even as they continue pursuing their individual passions and initiatives. That’s why the committee I mentioned has been so incredibly valuable in coordinating and promoting our efforts across our teaching, research and operations. Financing is another key challenge, but we’ve pioneered arrangements with Canada’s federal infrastructure bank as well as private lenders. Beyond these things, perhaps the biggest challenge we all face, at U of T and everywhere, is the temptation to get discouraged, given the scope of the climate crisis and the difficulty in maintaining momentum politically. But our community is undaunted, because we’ve demonstrated that major change is possible, and that we don’t have to wait for governments to act, as important as that is.
Sustainability often requires partnerships. How has UoT collaborated with local communities, governments, or industries to advance its sustainability agenda?
I mentioned our partnership with the Canada Infrastructure Bank, which also includes financing from other federal partners, provincial agencies and the private sector. The arrangement is enabling us to implement something we call Project LEAP, which has set us on track to reducing scope 1 and 2 emissions by 50 per cent before 2030 on our largest campus. This ground-breaking public-private partnership has been widely hailed as a model for the financing of large-scale carbon-reduction projects, in our country and well beyond, and U of T is working with the Toronto Region Board of Trade to help other organizations to pursue similar strategies.
What role do you believe universities should play in leading the global sustainability agenda?
Universities are extremely well positioned to lead the way. The University of Toronto, for example, is a large, very visible institution that’s been around for a long time and is here to stay. We’re one of the biggest landlords in the city, responsible for hundreds of buildings and hundreds of hectares of land, so the decisions we make can have a huge impact when it comes to sustainability. And, as I’ve said, our community includes a massive number of students, faculty and staff who are experts in every aspect of the challenge and deeply committed to meeting it. But U of T isn’t alone in offering these tremendous assets to our partners in the public, private and not-for-profit sectors. So governments should be engaging universities as key parts of their strategies for tacking climate change, and this is something U of T is encouraging at the national and international levels, including our work with Universities Canada, the University Climate Change Coalition (UC3) and the U7+ Alliance of World Universities.
What do you see as the next frontier in sustainability for higher education, and how is UoT preparing for it?
Scope 3 emissions are the hardest to address, but at U of T we’re starting to do so. For example, we’ve established a kind of internal carbon tax to mitigate the effects of air travel by faculty members, and we’ve funded a reforestation project on university-owned lands, using the proceeds from this ‘tax’. Apart from that, we need to redouble our efforts to increase the resiliency of communities and societies in the face of climate change, as extreme storms, fires and floods become more common around the world.
What legacy do you hope UoT leaves in the global sustainability landscape, and how will this shape the institution’s future?
I am incredibly proud of the U of T community and its global leadership in tackling this existential challenge of the 21st century. I hope our legacy in the next few decades will be to catalyse a powerful sense of hope that we really can rise to meet this challenge. We must not get discouraged, and we certainly should not give up.
