Integrating Sustainability in Higher computer Science Education

The world is facing urgent environmental, social, and economic challenges that require a collective shift towards sustainability. Education is increasingly recognized as a key driver for this change, making the integration of sustainability into curricula a critical concern. Computer science (CS), as a field that both contributes to and helps address global challenges, has a significant role to play.

However, integrating sustainability into CS education is not straightforward. It requires educators not only to understand sustainability but also to translate that understanding into meaningful teaching practices. Teachers are central to reorienting education toward sustainability, but their ability to do so depends on how they conceptualize sustainability and how this shapes their teaching approaches.

Educators may approach sustainability in different ways. Each approach calls for different teaching strategies and forms of pedagogical knowledge. To explore how sustainability is integrated into CS teaching, this study uses the framework of Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK), which focuses on how teachers blend subject knowledge with pedagogy. PCK provides a lens to examine not only what teachers know, but also how they choose, structure, and justify their teaching methods when sustainability is part of the curriculum.

Therefore, this study asks how do computer science educators understand sustainability, and how does this understanding influence the way they teach it within CS courses?