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IJSHE
20,2 Informal learning for
sustainability in higher
education institutions
378 Anastasia Luise Gramatakos and Stephanie Lavau
School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, University of Melbourne,
Received 12 October 2018 Melbourne, Australia
Revised 26 January 2019
7 March 2019
17 March 2019
Accepted 19 March 2019
Abstract
Purpose – Many higher education institutions are committed to developing students as skilled
professionals and responsible citizens for a more sustainable future. In addition to the formal curriculum for
sustainability education, there is an increasing interest in informal learning within universities. This paper
aims to extend the current understanding of the diversity and significance of informal learning experiences in
supporting students’ learning for sustainability.
Design/methodology/approach – Six focus groups were formed with 30 undergraduate and
postgraduate students from an Australian higher education institution committed to supporting graduate
competencies for sustainability. An inductive and qualitative inquiry was designed to enable participants to
reflect on the ways in which their university experiences support meaningful and significant learning for
sustainability.
Findings – The paper presents a typology of the diverse communities of informal learning that students
create and engage with. These range from ongoing to transient groups, from environmentally to more socially
oriented groups and from incidental to intended learning, from local to national in scale, with varying types
and degrees of connection to the formal curriculum and the university campus. The paper demonstrates that
these student-led experiences support three domains of learning: cognitive, practical and affective.
Originality/value – Deepening the understanding of the forms and significance of student-led learning
within their university experience contributes to the identification of the roles that informal learning may play
alongside formal education in developing graduates as agents of change for a more sustainable future.
Keywords Informal learning, Sustainability education, University, Co-curricular, Extracurricular,
Student-led learning
Paper type Research paper

Introduction
Higher education institutions (HEIs) are widely recognised as significant actors in the
transition to a more sustainable future through research, teaching and learning, campus
operations, industry engagement and community outreach (Cortese, 2003; McMillin and
Dyball, 2009; Murray, 2018). Consistent with recent calls for a “whole of institution”
approach to sustainability, there is vast evidence to demonstrate that HEIs are engaging in
efforts to embed and integrate sustainability across these various domains of activity
(Finlay and Massey, 2012; Goldman et al., 2015; McMillin and Dyball, 2009; Wals and
Blewitt, 2010).

International Journal of
Sustainability in Higher Education
Vol. 20 No. 2, 2019
pp. 378-392 The authors thank the anonymous reviewers, session participants at the 20th Biennial AAEE
© Emerald Publishing Limited National Conference and university colleagues for their comments on previous versions of this paper.
1467-6370
DOI 10.1108/IJSHE-10-2018-0177 They are grateful to the study participants for sharing their experiences.
 As such, many HEIs are now committed to the development of graduates with the Informal
capacity to support more sustainable futures, both as skilled professionals and as learning
responsible citizens (Shephard, 2008; Sterling, 2010a; Vare and Scott, 2007). This is reflected
in statements of graduate attributes published by universities, which in recent times more
frequently and explicitly identify graduates as change makers for sustainability,
demonstrating competencies in areas such as social responsibility and global perspective
and working across disciplines and cultures (Lee et al., 2013; Thomas and Day, 2014).
This paper engages with the ever-growing body of studies on the ways in which higher
379
education can support the development of such competencies in graduates. In addition to the
considerable scholarship on the role of formal curriculum in sustainability education
(Biasutti et al., 2018; Hopkinson and James, 2010; Howlett et al., 2016; Rose et al., 2015), there
is increasing interest in the ways in which informal learning has the potential to develop and
empower students as agents of change (Barth et al., 2007; Cortese and Hattan, 2010;
Hopkinson et al., 2008). In what follows, it is argued that approaching such issues from a
more student-centric starting point extends our understanding of the diversity and
significance of informal learning in the development of graduates as skilled, responsible
citizens and professionals for a more sustainable future.
In the next section, different approaches to sustainability education are reviewed and
then brought into conversation with the limited work to date on co-curricular or
extracurricular learning for sustainability in higher education settings (including informal
learning). The study site and research method are then presented, being focus groups with
undergraduate and postgraduate students at an Australian HEI. In discussing the results of
this study, the paper firstly highlights the diverse sites in which informal learning occurs
within the university, in particular the range of communities of informal learning that
students create and engage with beyond the classroom. Secondly, the paper identifies three
domains of informal learning (cognitive, practical and affective) that intersect in students’
experiences of informal learning. Adding such texture to the understanding of informal
sustainability learning enables the identification of the roles that these experiences may play
alongside formal education in developing graduates as agents of change for a more
sustainable future.

Learning for sustainability in higher education institutions: beyond the formal

curriculum
To better understand the ways in which HEIs contribute to the development of graduates
for sustainability, over the past decade, there has been considerable analysis of different
approaches to sustainability education, their key learning processes and the competencies
that they support.
In the first instance, the literature on sustainability education has focussed on a
distinction between instrumental and intrinsic education. An instrumental approach is
concerned with first-order learning, that is, the transmission of content that is designed to
improve understanding that informs behaviour change (Vare and Scott, 2007; Sterling,
2010a; Wals, 2011). This approach tends to be deterministic, normative and prescriptive,
premised on a high level of confidence in both our current knowledge base and our sense of
what is right (Sterling, 2010a; Wals, 2011). In contrast, sustainability education focussed on
second-order or intrinsic learning (i.e. learning about learning) is process rather than
content-oriented, empowering students to be autonomous thinkers, to be critically reflective,
and to negotiate alternative pathways for change in the face of uncertainty and complexity
(Vare and Scott, 2007; Sterling, 2010a; Wals, 2011).
IJSHE Extending on these two approaches are the more recent calls for transformative
20,2 sustainability education (Barrett et al., 2017; Burns, 2015, 2018; Jickling and Wals, 2008;
Sipos et al., 2008; Sterling, 2010b; Thomas, 2009). One commonly cited definition of
transformative sustainability learning is that of Sipos et al. (2008, p. 69): “learning that
facilitates personal experience for participants resulting in profound changes in knowledge,
skills and attitudes related to enhancing ecological, social and economic justice”. Sterling
380 (2010b, p. 23) proposes that such transformative learning is founded on “a shift of
epistemology or operative way of knowing and thinking that frames people’s perception of,
and interaction with, the world”, and as such, it resonates with third-order learning. Some
argue more specifically for a relational onto-epistemological approach, which is more
attentive to different ways of knowing and our interconnectedness with the more-than-
human world (Barrett et al., 2017; Burns, 2018; Harmin et al., 2017).
Despite such differences in their “transformative aspirations” (Selby and Kagawa, 2018,
p. 304), these visions for transformative sustainability learning articulate significant
changes in understanding and perspective, evaluative and practical skills, and disposition
and identity. As such, they intersect both instrumental and intrinsic learning, as Sterling
(2010a, 2010b) has argued, whilst emphasising some additional key qualities, including:
 a strong social dimension to learning, for example, through co-created knowledge,
peer learning and collective identity (Clark, 2016; Illeris, 2014; Sterling, 2010a);
 action-oriented learning, for example, through participatory democracy and citizen
engagement (Fagan, 2009; Jickling and Wals, 2008);
 learning that integrates across cognitive, practical, sensorial and even spiritual
domains (Burns, 2015, 2018; Selby and Kagawa, 2018; Sipos et al., 2008); and
 engagement with multiple, and often marginalised, ways of knowing (Barrett et al.,
2017; Harmin et al., 2017).

Moore (2005) questions whether transformative learning is an appropriate or achievable

goal for all students, suggesting that some may be satisfied with content-oriented learning
(i.e. first order learning), whereas others might resist the social or emotional aspects of
transformative learning. Addressing this concern, Illeris (2014, pp. 583-584) states that “the
key challenge of promoting transformative learning is to find and connect to the
psychological or practical, internal or external potentials in the learners’ existence and life
world that are so strong that they can justify the exertion involved in a transformation”.
Herein lies a potential challenge for HEIs in supporting transformative sustainability
learning, in that institutional, formal modes of teaching may struggle to connect with the
“life world” of individual students within a classroom setting.
In considering the role of HEIs in sustainability education, it is unsurprising that most
attention to date has been directed towards the ways in which the formal curriculum
supports these various aspects of learning. Such work has also identified its potential
shortcomings in delivering sustainability education, including: a curriculum crowded with
other demands; a strong focus on teaching content (i.e. first order learning); the long lead
time for curriculum change; a strong disciplinary focus; and, the limitations of staff and
institutional commitment (Barth, 2007; Dawe et al., 2005; Desha et al., 2009).
However, some studies have investigated the value of other forms of teaching and
learning that students experience at university in addition to their formal studies, sometimes
referred to as “co-curricular” (Cortese and Hattan, 2010) or “extracurricular” education
(Lipscombe, 2008; Lipscombe et al., 2008). This has included, for example, the “hidden
curriculum” of the university’s culture (Winter and Cotton, 2012), the university operations
as a “campus curriculum” (Hopkinson et al., 2008), non-credit bearing work experience or Informal
volunteering organised by the university (Munro et al., 2016), and student-led activities as learning
“informal curriculum” (Hopkinson et al., 2008).
Hopkinson et al. (2008, p. 436), in considering students’ university experience more
broadly, argue for an “integrated approach” to sustainability education that recognises
formal, informal and campus curricula as mutually reinforcing. In defining informal
learning as activities that are “largely student directed, voluntary, open to all and non-credit
bearing” (p. 439), they highlight the value for sustainability education of participation in 381
clubs and societies, voluntary work, internships, and campus events. This is consistent with
understandings of informal learning more generally, as being “without direct reliance on a
teacher or an externally-organized curriculum”, whether intentional or tacit, collective or
individual learning (Livingstone, 2001, p. 2; see also Schugurensky, 2010). In contrast to the
formal curriculum and other types of co-curricular or extra-curricular education, informal
learning is thus essentially voluntary and student-led.
In contrast with studies of university-driven curricula, programmes and initiatives, there
have been relatively few studies of the role of informal learning for sustainability in HEIs
(Barth et al., 2007; Clark, 2016; Hopkinson et al., 2008; Lipscombe, 2008; Lipscombe et al.,
2008; Kemmis and Mutton, 2012). One reason for this may be, as Clark (2016, p. 561)
suggests, that “formal learning is incorrectly assumed to occur only in formal settings, and
informal and self-directed learning incorrectly assumed to occur only outside of classrooms
or institutions”. Another reason may be that some student-led activities are predominantly
framed or valued as “action” for sustainability (Murray, 2018), and this may “obscure the
‘education’ element” (Kemmis and Mutton, 2012, p. 204). Even within the relatively limited
body of work on informal learning in HEIs, most studies have primarily investigated the
perspective of the institutions themselves, rather than the students, with a few notable
exceptions (Barth et al., 2007; Lipscombe, 2008).
In contrasting co-curricular or extra-curricular learning with formal education, several
studies have highlighted some of the useful qualities of informal learning for sustainability
as being relatively unstructured by disciplinary norms; extending the reach of sustainability
education within the university; linking formal education, campus operations and the wider
community; fostering a culture of sustainability within and beyond the university; offering
real life experience in a protected, supportive environment; and flexibility and
responsiveness, being less subject to formal structures and regulations (Barth et al., 2007;
Hopkinson et al., 2003; Lipscombe, 2008; Lipscombe et al., 2008; Kemmis and Mutton, 2012).
Informal learning thus addresses some of the concerns identified above with formal
learning, as well connecting to key aspects of the different approaches to sustainability
education introduced earlier.
Despite such promise, the paucity of studies of informal sustainability learning within
HEIs means that the characterisation of this domain of learning remains rather limited and
confined to institutional perspectives, raising questions about the ways in which students
experience informal learning within higher education, and how these experiences may
contribute to their development as critically engaged and active change makers.

Study site
The study site for this research was an Australian university that aspires to be a role model
of an ecologically sustainable community. The university is signatory to several
international agreements and its sustainability policy identifies targets and actions across
research, teaching and learning, community engagement, operations and governance. A
commitment to sustainability education is reflected in the university’s graduate attributes
IJSHE statement, which presents the graduate as leading change for a sustainable future and
20,2 respecting social inclusion, human rights, ethics and the environment. There is growing
interest from students in aspects of sustainability, as demonstrated through enrolments in
environment-related courses, the university’s sustainability survey and student groups and
activism on issues of environmental and social justice. These commitments from the
university and students provide an opening for this study of the ways in which the
382 university experience supports the development of graduates as skilled professionals and
responsible citizens for sustainability.

Methods
The aim of the study that informs this paper was to investigate students’ perspectives on the
diverse ways in which their university experience supports learning for sustainability. With
this exploratory rather than comprehensively descriptive or explanatory purpose (Neuman,
2014), an inductive and qualitative inquiry was designed which enabled participants to
reflect on and interpret their university experiences. The research was designed to ‘start
with the students’, rather than asking students about learning experiences that the
researchers or the university might pre-judge as important. The study was reviewed and
approved by a university human research ethics committee.
An intensive focus on this site (rather than an extensive survey across multiple sites)
enabled the development of a detailed picture of different types of sustainability learning
experiences of students at this institution, which may well figure in other university
contexts. In other words, the research was not designed to be representative of or
comprehensively survey the student population of this university or HEIs more broadly, nor
to make claims about the distribution or frequency of these types of learning experiences.
Focus groups provided an interactive format in which participants could share detailed
description and reflection, whilst adding to, interrogating, and contrasting with one
another’s perspectives on the topic (Hennink and Leavy, 2014). A purposive sampling
strategy (Neuman, 2014) was used to design a series of focus groups, each themed by a
particular academic stream or interest group, to assemble a sample of participants with
different levels and types of engagement with sustainability issues through their university
experience (e.g. whether through undergraduate/postgraduate studies or involvement with
clubs or societies, with greater or lesser degree of sustainability focus). Themed groups were
employed to foster a supportive conversational dynamic, with the element of common
experience providing a level of comfort for participants in sharing their perspectives and
questioning one another, which is particularly useful for discussions requiring a high degree
of personal reflection (Hennink and Leavy, 2014).
Participants were recruited by advertising in lectures and at events, as well as emailing
relevant campus groups. Six focus groups of two hours were conducted (referred to in text
as FG1-FG6), with a total of 30 participants. The composition of the sample included:
 local (n = 21) and international (9);
 undergraduate (12) and postgraduate (18);
 female (18) and male (12); and
 students (28) and recent alumni (2).

The study was framed for participants as an enquiry into meaningful and significant
sustainability learning in their university experience. Conversation was generated through a
semi-structured discussion guide and an interactive mapping exercise, designed to prompt
reflection on the role of HEIs in supporting the development of graduate sustainability
competencies; their experiences of sustainability learning at university; the practices that Informal
supported these learning experiences; and the ways in which these experiences have learning
influenced their personal and professional development.
The subsequent transcripts and annotated maps were uploaded as sources into nVivo 10,
and then analysed using an iterative, inductive process in which categories were developed
directly from the data. Informed by grounded theory, this was consistent with the study’s
exploratory approach in limiting the researchers’ predetermination of what might be
important in student learning (Neuman, 2014). Transcripts were read several times to 383
develop familiarity with the data, before proceeding through open, axial and then selective
coding (Neuman, 2014), as follows. First, all responses that were relevant to the research aim
were coded into a hierarchy of categories that represented emergent themes. Next, these
categories and their relations were reviewed and refined. Finally, a systematic pass through
the data was guided by the codes. This paper reports specifically on the responses coded as
relating to student experiences of informal learning for sustainability.

Results and discussion

In discussing the range of their significant sustainability learning experiences at university,
participants in all six focus groups highlighted diverse examples within and beyond the
formal curriculum. In these reflections on their university experience, cases of informal
learning were often identified and attributed a significant role in their learning for
sustainability. In the analysis to follow, the focus is on student experiences of informal
learning, or in the words of one student, learning in the “in-between spaces” of the university
(Sonya, FG2). Two key themes that emerged in the analysis of these student experiences are
explored in turn – communities of informal learning and domains of informal learning –
highlighting connections with significant aspects of sustainability learning identified in the
literature.

Communities of informal learning

A key theme that emerged in the discussion of student-led learning in all six focus groups
was the prominence and diversity of communities of learning, that is, the different
gatherings created by students through which they shared and supported one another’s
sustainability learning. This section distinguishes and addresses in turn the following types
of communities of informal learning for sustainability: student activist groups; recreational
and social student clubs; national student networks; student competition groups; and extended
classroom communities.
Given that most participants were extremely passionate and committed to sustainability
issues, many of them were involved to varying degrees with student activist groups on
campus, with concerns ranging from poverty, fair trade and social justice to climate change
and biodiversity. In the following exchange, two students described action-oriented,
sustainability learning through the collective work of their student environmental activist
group:
It’s a supportive environment, where you can feel comfortable and safe and held by others, and
that means so much to me. We live in a world that’s very, like, hyper individualising. (Li, FG3)

Before uni I would definitely call myself environmental, but I felt really kind of alone. Whereas I
think the difference [in being part of this group] is that there’s 25 other people. Even though that
was not a big number, that was huge. Because it was a collective effort, doing this thing or that,
everyone really wanted to do it and make it happen. You could see that it was probably making or
effecting change (in ourselves and the university). (Sasha, FG3)
IJSHE This example highlights the importance to these students of learning alongside others,
20,2 sharing a motivation for learning and a sense of identity, in the development of what Clark
(2016, p. 560) terms “collective action competencies” for sustainability, in other words, “the
intersection of social learning with action or behaviour change by a group”.
Other students described the development of learning communities through campus-
based clubs and societies with a more recreational or social orientation. These groups did
384 not necessarily have a primary focus on sustainability concerns, and their interests ranged
widely, including gardening, bicycle maintenance, food and outdoor sports. A postgraduate
law student drew attention to the value of such clubs in bringing together multidisciplinary
groups of students:
[E]ngaging with people from different lenses, or different backgrounds [. . .] I think that’s
something that those external groups like the mountaineering club and even the community
garden do well, bringing people together from quite siloed faculties, like commerce, law and hard
sciences, where you wouldn’t necessarily have broader engagement with ideas and people, and I
think [these groups] offer that. (Charles, FG2)
Reflecting on his experiences of sustainability learning, this student identifies the value of
recreational and social clubs in bringing together students from otherwise “siloed” faculties,
providing opportunities to engage with other disciplinary perspectives or “lenses”, a
commonly cited graduate competency for sustainability (Phelan et al., 2015; Thomas and
Day, 2014). Whilst not articulated herein, such groups may also provide avenues for
extending sustainability learning to “those that ‘curriculum greening’ fails to reach”
(Lipscombe et al., 2008, p. 224).
In contrast to these examples of local, well-established student groups, a third
community of learning highlighted by several participants was that of national student
networks. These ranged from formal groups, such as the Australian Student Environmental
Network (ASEN) and Fossil Free Universities Australia, to networking events, such as the
annual Students of Sustainability (SOS) conference. These national groups and events bring
together students from across the country to share a transient rather than sustained
experience, but ones nonetheless recognised as significant student-led learning
opportunities. In some instances, the experience was one of developing factual knowledge:
“ASEN played a big role in me understanding why the world isn’t environmentally
sustainable” (Sue, FG3). The following example demonstrates a more affective and intensive
experience through which the student re-evaluates the interrelations of their lifeworld
(Burns, 2018):
Students of Sustainability, that was pretty landmark in my university life because it was
alternative learning as well. SOS is 5 days [. . .] all focussed around first nation solidarity and
environmental issues. The Australian context, for me that was such a big thing [. . .] You get out
of the city and meet people from all over Australia [. . .] It makes you feel bigger than you are, so I
think that was really important for me. (Sasha, FG3)
In talking of “feel[ing] bigger than you are”, the student articulated the importance of this
transient and extended community for their learning for sustainability.
Another form of transient learning community discussed by several participants in one
focus group was that of student-led, competitive teamwork events, which often bring
together students (who may or may not already know one another) with people from
external organisations and other universities to generate and develop sustainability
strategies or solutions. A recent example was a climate hackathon (an intensive and
collaborative problem-solving event) organised by a postgraduate environmental group:
 One thing that I'd like to see developed further is the design [hack] programmes that come out of Informal
the university from students [. . .] It draws together external community with education. It's
getting students involved from the university with external communities, private sectors [. . .]
learning
You put them together in a room and blurt ideas out, and a lot of those ideas follow current
research themes and things which you could change both within the university and the city [. . .]
So it’s like a real integrated hub. (Oscar, FG1)
The student described as an “integrated hub”, the way in which a ‘hackathon’ can support
students, staff and practitioners in working across sectors and disciplines for sustainability 385
problem-solving. As such, these events offer opportunity for action-oriented sustainability
learning (Jickling and Wals, 2008), in which “learners have the opportunity to interact with
people whose life experiences more than qualifies them to sit and debate” (Fagan, 2009, p. 2).
A final type of student-led learning community described by participants was that of an
extended classroom community. With examples from campus and field-based subjects,
many participants spoke of learning experiences prompted by students themselves as
extensions of shared subject experiences. One undergraduate student recounted their
experience of a class field trip to Aotearoa (New Zealand):
I learnt so much [on the field trip to New Zealand], all the formal, but then also just being with the
people. Going with a group of 20 environmental and geography students, we had lots of
vegetarians, talking about the environment, and how everyone was loving nature, not just what
we were learning about [in the field class]. (Macey, FG4)
In this example of “incidental learning” (Schugurensky, 2000), the academic setting of the
field class provided a ready-made community and a sustained, collective experience through
which students spontaneously shared and extended their knowledge and perspectives
beyond the formal curriculum of the subject. In another case, a participant spoke of the
importance of learning with “lecture friends” in translating “very abstract” knowledge from
the classroom into conversations about real-world situations and what it might mean to be a
responsible environmental citizen (Lana, FG3).
These student accounts of sustainability learning in their university experience draw
attention to a broader range of informal learning experiences within HEIs than has hitherto
been recognised. Extending on previous studies in which HEIs have highlighted campus
events, clubs and societies as types of informal learning (Hopkinson et al., 2008; Lipscombe,
2008), the student participants in this study identified a diverse set of communities of
informal learning: student activist groups, student clubs and societies, national student
networks, student competition groups, and extended academic communities. These forms of
student-led learning emphasise learning as social, whether manifesting as peer learning,
collective meaning-making or shared identity, all of which have been recognised as key
aspects of transformative sustainability learning (Burns, 2015; Clark, 2016; Illeris, 2014;
Sterling, 2010a). This study does not seek to imply that all, or even most, co-curricular
learning within HEIs is mediated through such communities. Rather, it demonstrates that
there is a greater diversity of such informal learning communities than has hitherto been
recognised by previous studies, and which participants identify as significant to their
learning for sustainability.
These communities of informal learning ranged from ongoing to transient, from
environmentally to socially-oriented, from incidental to intended learning, from local to
national, with varying types and degrees of connection to the formal curriculum and the
university campus. According to the students, these experiences of informal learning often
complemented, and even activated, learning for sustainability within the formal curriculum
in various ways, whether by broadening perspectives, translating from principles into
IJSHE practice, motivating learning, further developing critical reflection skills, or experiencing
20,2 other knowledge systems. Despite the dichotomy suggested by the terminology of “formal”
and “informal” learning, these experiences shared by participants support claims that they
are certainly not always so discrete, whether in terms of the intent, scale, outcomes, sites or
communities of learning (Clark, 2016; Lipscombe, 2008; Schugurensky, 2000).

386 Domains of informal learning: cognitive, practical and affective

A second theme that emerged in focus group discussions was the ways in which these
student-led learning experiences operated across different domains of learning. This section
addresses participants’ experiences of informal learning as cognitive, practical and affective.
Despite cognitive learning being more readily associated with formal university studies,
most participants also identified student-led learning as supporting critical thinking on
sustainability issues, whether through reading, conversations, listening to guest speakers or
interrogating university policies and practices. Often such cognitive learning intersected
their academic studies, sometimes reinforcing but at other times challenging what was
being learnt in the classroom. At other times, informal learning experiences involved
engagement with ideas or perspectives that were less familiar or new to the student:
I wasn’t really too well-read about [climate change] because it wasn’t really in my subjects [. . .]
Just from friends and being exposed to this environment at the university, this prompted me to
think more about it, look it up more, and also spread it around. (Ed, FG4)

Getting involved in [this climate activist group] was the first place that I really had uni friends,
but also it changed a lot my thinking around climate change. [It was a] very anti-capitalist phase
and the first time I’d been exposed to those ideas from an environmental perspective. (Lucy, FG2)
As these two examples indicate, and as others have suggested (Hopkinson et al., 2008;
Lipscombe, 2008), cognitive learning for sustainability is by no means simply the preserve
of the formal curriculum. It can feature prominently in other aspects of students’ university
experience (i.e. informal and other forms of co-curricular learning), whether as improving
knowledge, understanding different perspectives or critical thinking about alternative
pathways and paradigms for sustainability.
In contrast to their accounts of formal learning as being primarily cognitive, however,
students tended to describe their informal learning experiences as connecting thinking,
doing and feeling. In stating, “you come out of a lecture and you’re like, ‘well that was really
depressing, what do we do’” (Li, FG3), or “how does that relates back to me [. . .] instead of
just sitting there, and letting the information flow into the head” (Jane, FG6), participants
articulated an ambition (shared by several other participants) to transform critical thinking
into practical application or personal practice.
The following student described how their involvement in lobbying for sustainability
policy change within the university assisted in developing their knowledge and professional
skills for facilitating policy change:
One experience for me over the last couple of years was policy change [within the university],
working out lots of different ways of working to get to the end point [. . .] It’s a real long game
[and] that’s something that would never have been said to me in a subject. A lot of this stuff
makes more sense when it’s being tested, like I’m trying to get a real thing done in the real world.
(Sonya, FG2)
The student implied that in the context of learning about policy change, the formal
curriculum was more limited to a cognitive approach, whereas her student activism
experience partnered knowing with doing, effectively as a form of “action-oriented learning”
(Fagan, 2009; Jickling and Wals, 2008). The short timeframe for individual subjects, and an Informal
emphasis on transmitting content, means that academic programmes are not always able to learning
offer students experiences of “the long game” as did this case of sustained involvement with
a student-led political action.
In focus group discussions, students also frequently expressed a desire to better
understand how to apply theories and concepts addressed in their studies to their personal
practice. For some students, informal learning experiences provided such opportunities. As
highlighted earlier, for Lana (FG3) this was about translating “abstract” knowledge into her 387
personal development as an “environmental citizen”. The following student, having
completed several university subjects related to agri-food systems, sought out some hands-
on experience of agriculture and volunteered on the farm of another student:
I think being really involved in the food system has more and more emphasised what I want to
see out of it. In the lead up to that I think it was a slow transition [from] “I don’t support what this
company is doing” to actually being there and having those connections, [which] I think was a big
switch in holding myself accountable in my own decisions. (Elise, FG6)
Through experiential learning about food systems, the student applied critical thinking
from her agri-food studies to the evaluation and modification of her behaviour in relation to
practices of production and consumption, such that “personal transformation [goes] hand in
glove with learner interrogation of structural aspects of the consumer society” (Selby and
Kagawa, 2018, p. 309). In this example, student-led learning offered a pathway for a
substantial shift in identity and actions, articulated by this student as a “big switch” that
prompted such personal transformation.
A variety of the experiences that participants shared of informal learning also drew
attention to significant affective elements of learning. An undergraduate student explained
that through her ongoing role as a sustainability officer at her residential college on campus,
she developed a first-hand understanding of community resistance to change. Through this
experience, she revisited her assumptions about and developed strategies for supporting
pro-environmental behaviour change amongst her peers:
[I received] a lot of backlash when I tried to get rid of polystyrene cups. People got upset with me,
and didn’t want any sort of change. They said I was ruining the coffee lounge culture [. . .] [P]eople
my age, that have had the same sort of privileged upbringing, all living at college, well-educated, I
thought that at least that sort of person would be on board, but they really weren’t. It was sort of a
life lesson. (Ellie, FG5)
In this case, the student’s residential life on the university campus provided practical
experience in negotiating and facilitating behaviour change. The “life lesson” that the
student articulated, however, was not just cognitive and practical. It was also affective
learning, in particular, feeling as relating (Kemmis and Mutton, 2012; Shephard, 2008;
Singleton, 2014), in this case learning to listen and respond in interactions with others.
Affective learning was also evident in participants’ accounts of their awareness of their
own emotional state, and in learning how to work with their emotions. The following
participant describes how through student-led, experiential learning at the site of landmark
environmental protests of the 1980s, she further developed her understanding of
conservation and protection beyond “the desk sort of stuff” of her formal studies:
I joined [the mountaineering club] and started going on hikes, and going down to Tasmania and
going past where they would have had the dams down the Franklin [. . .] You see what could have
been lost by not doing anything. So I moved back from doing behind the desk sort of stuff, to
going out [and getting involved in campaigning], so that’s been massive in terms of inspiration
and motivation. (Ida, FG2)
IJSHE This place-based learning experience, according to the student, was as emotional as it was
20,2 physical or intellectual; her affective engagement with loss motivated further learning and
compelled her to get involved in campaigning for conservation. “A significant emotional
event,” as Singleton has observed (2014, p. 8), “is often the impetus to change, to transform.”
Likewise for Selby and Kagawa (2018), transformative sustainability learning requires such
emotional and imaginative entanglement to support a shift from acknowledging evidence to
388 taking action.
Other students spoke of being “very despondent” (Lucy, FG2) or “down beat” (Li,
FG3) as a result of their formal studies, a familiar refrain from research on the
emotional and psychological impact of sustainability education, which may amplify
feelings of hopelessness, guilt and worry (Ojala, 2017; Selby and Kagawa, 2018). For Li
(FG3), the emotional processing of the despair produced through formal studies was
facilitated by discussions within a student environmental club, in which “it’s not just
being like ‘let’s just talk about the environment’, but also us, in the end, how are we
feeling.”
Sustainability education is often characterised as having cognitive (e.g. knowledge
and critical thinking), practical (e.g. action, application and physical labour) and
affective (e.g. emotions and interpersonal relations) dimensions (Christie et al., 2013;
Kemmis and Mutton, 2012; Orr, 1992; Phelan et al., 2015; Shephard, 2008; Singleton,
2015). For example, in their study of transformative sustainability learning in three
university teaching programmes, Sipos et al. (2008) describe the integration of learning
that engages with “heads, hands, and hearts” (i.e. cognitive, psychomotor, and affective
domains) through the formal curriculum. Similarly, in reviewing previous studies of
higher education, Shephard (2008) distinguishes knowledge, skills, and affective
learning outcomes, and identifies approaches to teaching the latter in university
sustainability education.
The results presented in this exploratory study demonstrate that informal learning
for sustainability can likewise have cognitive, practical, and affective dimensions. In
light of the observation by Illeris (2014, p. 149) and others (Shephard, 2008) on the
“precedence of the cognitive dimension” of learning in formal education, student-led
learning experiences can offer opportunities for addressing certain aspects of practical
and affective learning which are understood as core to sustainability learning, but
which may be challenging to accommodate within formal education. Indeed, this study
indicates that certain qualities more commonly present within informal learning
experiences can provide more amenable conditions for extending beyond cognitive
learning than can be offered by formal education, which has physical, temporal, social
and pedagogical constraints. These enabling qualities include learning experiences that
are more sustained, problem- or action-oriented or located in professionally or socially
significant sites outside of the university campus, as well as learning environments
within which students can have well-developed interpersonal networks, a higher level
of comfort with their peers, and positions of responsibility.
This is not to suggest that cognitive learning is, or should be, the domain of formal
education, and that practical and affective learning are, or should be, the domain of
informal learning. Rather, it is that within the diverse range of student-led learning
experiences (as highlighted in this study), there may be better conditions for
sustainability learning across these domains, and in ways that may support and
complement formal education in students’ development as skilled professionals and
responsible citizens for a more sustainable future.
Conclusion Informal
I’m really worried about the future of where we are going. I can see we are heading towards learning
making a lot more [teaching and learning] online and I think so much is going to be lost if coming
into campus isn’t prioritised. I think the interesting things that happen are in the in-between
spaces, and not because you are sitting behind a screen watching a lecture. (Sonya, FG2)
By starting with the students, this research has revealed a greater diversity of informal
sustainability learning within students’ university experience than has been identified in 389
previous studies, which in turn has implications for our understanding of its significance for
sustainability education in HEIs. Firstly, this paper has presented a preliminary typology of
the communities of informal sustainability learning that students create and engage with:
student activist groups; recreational and social student clubs; national student networks;
student competition groups and, extended classroom communities. Students’ accounts of
such communities of informal learning reflected the significance for many of them of
learning as a social endeavour, whether social in terms of learning with or from peers,
collective meaning-making or shared identity, all of which have been identified as key
aspects of sustainability learning (Clark, 2016; Illeris, 2014; Sterling (2010a, 2010b).
Secondly, the paper has demonstrated the ways in which these informal learning
experiences operate across cognitive, practical and affective domains, the integration of
which is often presented as essential to transformative sustainability education (Christie
et al., 2013; Sipos et al., 2008; Selby and Kagawa, 2018).
This exploratory study indicates that informal learning in the “in-between spaces” of a
student’s university experience may play a more varied and significant role in their development
as skilled professionals and responsible citizens for sustainability than has hitherto been
appreciated. Whilst elsewhere a strong case has been made for the importance of student-led
activities to sustainability action on and beyond campuses (Murray, 2018), this study has
provided further evidence of the importance of student-led activities as sustainability learning.
In particular, the study has identified diverse ways in which informal learning can
support the formal curriculum in students’ learning for sustainability, particularly in light of
some of the physical, social, temporal, and structural constraints of formal education in
universities. This includes, but is not limited to, providing more sustained learning
opportunities; assisting in translating cognitive learning into professional contexts and
skills; supporting students in connecting learning to their life-world; reaching groups of
students that do not engage with sustainability in their formal education; creating
opportunities for learning communities that transcend disciplinary and institutional
boundaries; providing supportive environments for emotional processing and affective
learning; and offering students roles of responsibility in real-world situations. In these ways,
and no doubt more, informal learning can extend the reach of, add depth to, and fill gaps in
the formal curriculum. Student-led activities can thus offer a valuable resource for, rather
than be a distraction from, sustainability education in HEIs. As such, the descriptor “co-
curricular” seems more fitting than “extra-curricular”.
Given this study’s limitations – its single site focus, sample composition and size, the
reliance on participants’ reporting and reflection – much is to be gained from both more
focussed and more comprehensive research into students’ experiences of informal
sustainability learning. In particular, observational techniques for evaluating learning in
practice and more sustained methods that deepen trust, would unearth a broader range of
experiences and their less tangible aspects (e.g. tacit knowledge and psychological
development). Research focussed on the inter-relations between informal and formal learning
would also provide firmer foundation for specific recommendations for professional practice
IJSHE and institutional commitments within HEIs. A broader survey across HEIs would indicate the
20,2 extent and relative importance of such informal learning. Meanwhile, as the final quote above
implies, much may be gained in taking seriously the practicalities of valuing and supporting
informal sustainability learning within HEIs.

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Further reading
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curricula in ESD”, International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, Vol. 19 No. 1,
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About the authors

Anastasia Luise Gramatakos is a graduate of the Master of Environment programme at The
University of Melbourne, specialising in sustainability education and social change. In 2018, she
worked as a Research Assistant in the School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences at The University of
Melbourne, before returning to further study of urban horticulture.
Stephanie Lavau is a Lecturer in Interdisciplinary Environmental Practice for the Office for
Environmental Programs and the School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences at The University of
Melbourne. Her teaching and research focusses on socio-cultural aspects of urban water
management, biodiversity conservation and environmental knowledges. Stephanie Lavau is the
corresponding author and can be contacted at: stephanie.lavau@unimelb.edu.au

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