Linking research and education to promote an integrated approach to sustainability

In 2003, researchers from various disciplines (biology, physics, geology, economics, sociology, linguistics, psychology and science education) founded the Centre IRIS – Interdisciplinary Research Institute on Sustainability (www.iris.unito.it) based at the University of Torino (Italy). IRIS links research in science with educational practice: as new conceptual tools are produced and research findings are published, they are discussed within the group and ‘metabolised’, turned into literacy and advanced courses on sustainability, which are then offered in contexts of tertiary level education, i.e. for future researchers and future teachers. As IRIS members hold different courses in a number of areas in the University, the group plays a crucial role in promoting transdisciplinary competences and a new awareness of environmental, social and personal sustainability. This is done through direct interaction with the students as well as indirectly, with a cascade effect on professional teams and school children. Sustainability issues are still marginal in the context of the University of Turin: IRIS is sustained mainly by local Institutions. IRIS is actually engaged in the following, interconnected issues: planet’s bio capacity; active role of natural systems; bio-geochemical cycles and biochemical guilds; economics, ecology, ethics: ‘services’ of nature at the local/global scale; management of common pool resources; the nonviolent approach to conflict transformation; sustainability at a personal level: towards an ecological identity.