SDG Publishers Compact Fellows
Introduction
Aligning academic research and education with the SDGs is crucial for a sustainable future. HESI therefore tasked a multi-stakeholder action group of sustainability experts, practitioners, academic publishers and researchers to help improve these alignments.
In support of the United Nations SDG Publishers Compact, co-created by the International Publishers Association and the United Nations in 2020, HESI launched a SDG Publishers Compact Fellows action group. The action group’s participants, from publishing and academia, are working on 4 key focus areas in support of HESI’s aim to “enhance the role of the higher education sector in advancing sustainable development by facilitating multi-stakeholder discussions, actions, and the dissemination of best practices”.
Integration of the SDGs into Educational Materials: The Academic Societies and Textbooks sub-group is developing ways for publishers to better recognize and address the lack of SDG-related content in their educational materials. This includes presentation materials for conferences and other relevant stakeholder meetings to build awareness around the SDGs. Furthermore, the participants are addressing the complex question of what will make an educational resource an SDG resource. The expected outcome is that instructors, traditional-aged students, and lifelong learners will feel inspired and empowered with quality knowledge and resources around the SDGs so they will be motivated to act with confidence, knowing how to contribute to a sustainable future.
Putting the SDGs into practice: The Connecting Academic Researchers and Practitioners sub-group is focused on developing best practices that will foster communications and build stronger relationships between academic research and those who use research - the practitioners (such as businesses, governments and nonprofits). The group is working on encouraging authors, editors, and publishers to include research implications for practitioners in abstracts, plain language summaries and additional formats useful and appealing to practitioners. They also created the “Top Actions” tips to encourage the integration of SDGs into daily practice and to stimulate research agendas based on the challenges and opportunities SDG practitioners face. The sub-group is also working on integration teaching, research and acting on the SDGs as required criteria for accreditation within academic programs and higher education institutions.
Redefining impact: The Impact and Reach sub-group is focused on changing the traditional ways research impact is measured and viewed, specifically looking at academic rankings and incentives. Multiple “Top Actions” tips for publishers, editors, authors, librarians and graduate students are available. The group is preparing and sharing collections of resources to highlight seminal SDG research articles and their impact on policy, education, society and beyond. In addition, to ease the identification, collection, and labelling of SDG-aligned content, the group is working with other stakeholders in academic publishing on the development of a standardised SDG taxonomy to be used by researchers, publishers and policymakers alike.
Changing the culture in higher education: A sub-group on Changing Culture is taking steps to affect culture change throughout the academic and publishing ecosystem. This group is evaluating the various stakeholders and what their needs are to move the focus toward the SDGs. While the initial focus has been on connecting with and elevating those already working with SDGs, the group is transitioning to highlighting additional associations (e.g. journal editors), companies (e.g. publishers) and institutions (e.g. educators and researchers) and the spaces where they could immediately incorporate the SDGs.
If you are an academic publisher and would like to get involved, please join HESI and review the informational links in the Progress reports below.