Environmentally Sustainable Practices Among College Outdoor Programs and Their Association With Organizational Support Structures

Authors

  • Eric Frauman Appalachian State University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18666/JOREL-2017-V9-I2-7492

Keywords:

environmental behavior, higher education, sustainable initiatives

Abstract

Sustainability has gained increasing importance amongst both academic research and organizational practice over the past two decades (Davis & Challenger, 2014). The primary purpose of this study was to examine environmentally sustainable practices among college outdoor programs, while also examining how college level policy and infrastructural support may be associated with such practices. Of additional interest was to examine how environmental policies established at the programmatic level may differentially influence practice versus policies at the institutional level. College and university outdoor program directors were sampled in 2014 concerning their engagement in various pro-environment practices and perceptions of institutional support. The findings revealed the organizational culture and infrastructural support at responding institutions does make a positive difference in outdoor program sustainable practices, as does the level environmental policy is established at. Future research efforts should consider a more systemic and systematic approach to studying this topic given its increasing importance and visibility on college campuses.

Subscribe to JOREL

References

AASHE (April, 2016). About AASHE. Retrieved at http://www.aashe.org/about.

Crane, A. (2000). Corporate greening as amoralization. Organization Studies, 21, 673-696.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0170840600214001

Davis, M.C., & Challenger, R. (2014). Environmentally sustainable work behaviors. In P.C. Flood & Y. Freeney (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Management: Organizational Behavior (3rd ed., Vol. 11), Chichester, UK: Wiley.

Davis, M.C., Challenger, R., & Jayewardene, D.N., & Clegg, C.W. (2014). Advancing socio-technical systems thinking: A call for bravery. Applied Ergonomics, 45(2), 171-180.

Davis, M.C., & Coan, P. (2015). Organizational Change. In J.L. Robertson & J. Barling (Eds.), The Psychology of Green Organizations (pp. 244-274), Oxford University Press.

NIRSA (April, 2016). Sustainability in collegiate recreation. Retrieved at http://nirsa.net/nirsa/sustainability/.

Norton, T. A., Zacher, H., & Ashkanasy, N. M. (2014). Organisational sustainability policies and employee green behaviour: The mediating role of work climate perceptions. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 38, 49-54.

Ramus, C. A., & Steger, U. (2000). The Roles of Supervisory Support Behaviors and Environmental Policy in Employee "Ecoinitiatives" at Leading-Edge European Companies. The Academy of Management Journal, 43 (4), 605-626. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1556357

Second Nature (April, 2016). Who we are: mission. Retrieved at http://secondnature.org/who-we-are/mission/.

STARS (April, 2016). STARS overview. Retrieved at https://stars.aashe.org/pages/about/stars-overview.html

Downloads

Published

2017-05-22

Issue

Vol. 9 No. 2 (2017)

Section

Regular Papers

License

Sagamore Publishing LLC (hereinafter the “Copyright Owner”)

Journal Publishing Copyright Agreement for Authors

PLEASE REVIEW OUR POLICIES AND THE PUBLISHING AGREEMENT, AND INDICATE YOUR ACCEPTANCE OF THE TERMS BY CHECKING THE ‘AGREE TO THE TERMS OF THIS COPYRIGHT NOTICE’ CHECKBOX BELOW.

I understand that by submitting an article to Journal of Outdoor Recreation, Education, and Leadership, I am granting the copyright to the article submitted for consideration for publication in Journal of Outdoor Recreation, Education, and Leadership to the Copyright Owner. If after consideration of the Editor of the Journal of Outdoor Recreation, Education, and Leadership, the article is not accepted for publication, all copyright covered under this agreement will be automatically returned to the Author(s).

THE PUBLISHING AGREEMENT

Assignment of Copyright

I hereby assign to the Copyright Owner the copyright in the manuscript I am submitting in this online procedure and any tables, illustrations or other material submitted for publication as part of the manuscript in all forms and media (whether now known or later developed), throughout the world, in all languages, for the full term of copyright, effective when the article is accepted for publication.

Reversion of Rights

Articles may sometimes be accepted for publication but later be rejected in the publication process, even in some cases after public posting in “Articles in Press” form, in which case all rights will revert to the Author.

Retention of Rights for Scholarly Purposes

I understand that I retain or am hereby granted the Retained Rights. The Retained Rights include the right to use the Preprint, Accepted Manuscript, and the Published Journal Article for Personal Use and Internal Institutional Use.

All journal material is under a 12 month embargo. Authors who would like to have their articles available as open access should contact Sagamore-Venture for further information.

In the case of the Accepted Manuscript and the Published Journal Article, the Retained Rights exclude Commercial Use, other than use by the author in a subsequent compilation of the author’s works or to extend the Article to book length form or re-use by the author of portions or excerpts in other works.

Published Journal Article: the author may share a link to the formal publication through the relevant DOI.

Author Representations

  • The Article I have submitted to the journal for review is original, has been written by the stated author(s) and has not been published elsewhere.
  • The Article was not submitted for review to another journal while under review by this journal and will not be submitted to any other journal.
  • The Article contains no libelous or other unlawful statements and does not contain any materials that violate any personal or proprietary rights of any other person or entity.
  • I have obtained written permission from copyright owners for any excerpts from copyrighted works that are included and have credited the sources in the Article.
  • If the Article was prepared jointly with other authors, I have informed the co-author(s) of the terms of this Journal Publishing Agreement and that I am signing on their behalf as their agent, and I am authorized to do so.