Sustainable Study Abroad

Mark Schaub Executive Director

My family is running out of space in our yard for any more trees. We plant them because we love them, but also because it’s a positive for the environment. One of my thoughts in October, while planting another 10 trees on our yard was, “Great. I just offset all the carbon I burned on that business trip last week to the Netherlands.” My self-satisfaction, though, was short-lived: when I went online to carbonnuetral.com I was horrified to discover that I (or more accurately, GVSU—my  employer) would have had to plant over 72 trees to offset the 1.5 metric tons of carbon that trip added to the atmosphere. And there many companies and organizations—both reputable and disreputable—that would be happy to take between $30 and $230 to “offset” that GVSU business trip.

It should be no surprise that I sometimes wonder if the phrase “sustainable study abroad” is a kind of oxymoron. After all, few activities are as unsustainable, in a big-picture sense, as getting on a jet aircraft to fly halfway around the world to enroll in university-level courses. This is especially so when by comparison you can get on the Rapid’s bus #50 and get to class right here in West Michigan. Still, many GVSU faculty and staff continue to work with Padnos International Center to encourage ever more students to get on planes to study abroad, as well as climb aboard airliners around the world to come here—to GVSU—to study as international students. Despite the need for all of us to think more carefully about the environmental impact of our local and international travel, we are doing the right thing.

As everyone concerned about climate change knows, we all must collectively change the world…or else. Fortunately, the best study abroad experiences are about changing the world for the better.

Our children and grandchildren will be better off if we re-consider the American Dream. Right now, our “American” way of life is the least sustainable way of life; it is less sustainable, in that Americans individually use more resources and emit more carbon, than individuals in any other nation. Sustainability is a social justice issue. GVSU’s Director of Sustainability, Norman Christopher, reminds us that sustainability is not just about the environment, it’s about economic sustainability, and social health: the “triple bottom line.” Sustainable study abroad, and a lifetime of sustainable living upon return from that study abroad, is a way we can help students to individually and collectively become global citizens who think globally and act locally.

Being abroad for a full, and responsibly lived, semester will offset that plane trip—and it will offset it over a lifetime. How can semesters abroad do that? Let me count the ways:

1. See how the rest of the world lives. For decades, Germans and other western Europeans have been carrying their own reusable shopping bags to the grocer, whereas it’s a radical new concept here in the USA. Recycling, public transport, walking, fewer showers, and building things to last are other non-American traditions that semester abroad students really miss when they get back to the land of fast food, waste, exurban sprawl, and strip malls with a 20-year lifespan. We have much to learn from other societies—from the ragpickers of Delhi to the rububikia of Cairo, and we would have a more sustainable lifestyle if we adopted those lessons. We have many successes at GVSU to share with others (e.g., our tremendous growth in bus ridership); we just need to know that much of what we’re doing is catching on to what the rest of the world is doing.
2. Engage in the local community. Visiting a country for a week or two doesn’t allow students to develop the earth friendly habits of their host society, but spending 16 weeks there does. Many GVSU students do volunteer and service-work that enhance the conditions for local schools and neighbors; visiting as a short-term tourist typically doesn’t provide opportunity to be a real help. The international students who planted 100 White Pine seedlings along M-45 during GVSU Sustainability Week wouldn’t have had that opportunity on a very short visit. It’s only by being here a whole semester and caring about GVSU and the world that they became connected to the opportunity. We hope they return to see the fruits of their labor as alumni!
3. Develop lifelong habits and awareness. My colleagues and I in International Education believe that if everyone studied abroad there wouldn’t be any wars. We really do think that. A semester abroad infuses ones imagination, one’s consciousness, with the real knowledge that we (everyone on earth) really are all in this together. That knowledge really does change the world.