Sustainable development in the working life
Finnish National Agency for Education in its foresight report (2019) brought up that the understanding of the principles of sustainable development is seen as the most important generic skill in the working life for the year 2035. In August 2024 Mirja Illikainen, the Vice Rector for Education at the University of Oulu, approved Sustainability, Responsibility and Ethics as one of the generic skills common to all degrees. The generic skills will be implemented into the curricula starting in the Autumn 2026. We asked from our alumni, how are the themes of sustainable development and sustainability present in their work.
Niyati Kandikanti graduated from a double-degree program in Oulu and is currently a doctoral researcher in biomedicine at the University of Tampere. She studies in vitro modeling in brain cancer treatments and wishes her field to have more awareness about sustainability issues. “Studying about sustainability will also help you to understand what is going on in the world and how to communicate with others, collaborate and be able to affect changes on a higher level. If you're more educated on matters that are complicated interplay of social, financial, and ecological aspects, you can construct better ideas or solutions for it on individual levels as well as on administrative levels.” Read Kandikanti’s alumni story here.
Kiia Palo, who studied Nordic Philology in Oulu, works as a communications specialist at the Keep the Archipelago Tidy organization. "Human activities are never entirely environmentally friendly, but we offer solutions to help individuals act more sustainably. Our communication reaches people at all levels of society, so a solution-oriented approach is important to us. We don't want to discourage by spreading fear, but rather encourage everyone to take action by emphasizing that environmental problems are issues everyone can do something about." Read Palo’s alumni story here (in Finnish).
MSc (Econ), doctoral researcher Julia Autio is currently working on her research at the University of Oulu on the sustainability transition in the forestry sector and the significance of individual values and actions in it. "The forest works as an excellent stage for sustainability transition as climate change affects things like forest pests and growing seasons. At the same time, forestry can at worst contribute to climate change, thus creating a vicious cycle. However, in business operations and innovations, there are also opportunities, for example to replace materials made from non-renewable resources with those derived from wood and forest resources." Read Autio’s alumni story here (in Finnish).
Want to include sustainable development and sustainability themes in your studies?
Sustainable Development Minor 25 ECTS – Study sustainable development and different dimensions of sustainability! This minor is organized in collaboration with all our university’s faculties, and it is open for all degree students at the University of Oulu. The minor can be studied in English. Also, it is possible to choose individual courses from the minor’s course selection. Some of the minor’s courses are also suitable for exchange students.
University of Oulu is also a member of several collaboration networks of higher education institutions through which students can study courses related to sustainability, responsibility, and/or environmental themes. Read here the instructions for cross-institutional studying and see course selections of different networks: Sustainability Studies Network, Climate University, UniPID and Biodiversity Education Network. Additionally UNIC’s course selection includes some courses related to sustainability.