Promoting Sustainability: Evaluation of Environmental Duty in Public Autonomous Universities of Mexico

Abstract

Given that theoretically and normatively there is a public duty of the Autonomous Universities in Mexico to promote the care of the environment, as a pillar to ensure the right to education, strengthening study programs through academic freedom and self-regulatory faculties and self-government, in addition to a social duty, where it is intended to generate a connection between education and sustainability to form environmentally conscious individuals. The objective of this research was to identify whether these faculties and the obligation to promote environmental education are being guaranteed within the Autonomous Public Universities in Mexico. To this end, a questionnaire was designed that identified academic programs, years of creation, social responsibility programs, and environmental and regulatory research in universities, implementing a dichotomous variable and descriptive statistics to model the data. The results indicate a commitment of these institutions to generate academic programs at different levels. In addition, good environmental practices in resource management and environmental training were identified. The identification of indicators to measure the efficiency of these practices is suggested as the next line of research, providing a deep understanding of the duty of care of universities in the Mexican context.