What are the material issues the organization has identified?

In its 2016 Sustainability Report the KU Leuven FEB identified a range of material issues, such as diversity and non-discrimination, gender equality, employee and student safety and welfare, economic impacts on local community, energy efficiency/CO2 reduction, waste reduction. Among these, integrating ethics, responsibility and sustainability themes into educational programs and research stands out as a key material issue for FEB.

Stakeholder engagement in accordance with the GRI Standards

The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) defines the Principle of Stakeholder Inclusiveness when identifying material issues (or a company’s most important impacts) as follows:

“The organization should identify its stakeholders, and explain how it has responded to their reasonable expectations.”

Stakeholders must be consulted in the process of identifying a company’s most important impacts and their reasonable expectations and interests must be taken into account. This is an important cornerstone for CSR / sustainability reporting done responsibly.

Key stakeholder groups the KU Leuven FEB engages with:   

Stakeholder Group

Staff members

Student population

How stakeholder engagement was made to identify material issues

To identify and prioritize material issues, the KU Leuven FEB carried out specific engagement activities:

• In academic year 2014-2015, focused, in-class stakeholder engagement activities were conducted with students in the Corporate Social Responsibility course (Brussels campus).
• In academic year 2015-2016, a FEB Sustainability and Diversity Survey among staff members and students on all campuses, was carried out.

What actions were taken by the KU Leuven FEB to integrate ethics, responsibility and sustainability themes into educational programs and research?

In its 2016 Sustainability Report the KU Leuven FEB reports that it took the following actions for integrating ethics, responsibility and sustainability themes into educational programs and research:

• Making sure ethics, responsibility and sustainability are present in FEB courses
• In 2015-2016 a curricular assessment, based on a terminology scan, was carried out, to assess whether and to what extent ethics, responsibility and sustainability (ERS) themes were included in FEB courses. According to the assessment:
  • social/societal welfare themes were dealt with in 358 courses
  • environmental themes were dealt with in 115 courses
  • ethics was dealt with in 71 courses
  • corporate social responsibility was dealt with in 47 courses
  • sustainability was dealt with in 36 courses
  • market failure was dealt with in 28 courses
  • stakeholder inclusiveness was dealt with in 27 courses

• Promoting education for sustainable development (ESD) through a range of learning activities
• Examples of such activities include:
  • The Interdisciplinary Assessment Project (IAP) gives masters students in Business Engineering, Environment, Health and Safety Management and students in some majors in Industrial Engineering the opportunity to work together in interdisciplinary teams to address real-world business problems involving sustainability issues.
  • The International Study Visit to London brings students in the Environment, Health, and Safety program in contact with selected sustainable development/corporate social responsibility themes, in order to compare the Belgian to the UK perspective.

• Focusing research on ethics, responsibility and sustainability issues
• At the KU Leuven FEB, a number of research centres are focused on ethics, responsibility and sustainability (ERS) themes, including the following:
  • The Centre for Economics and Corporate Sustainability (CEDON), an interdisciplinary research group, is focused on the interactions between economics, business, sustainable development and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).
  • The Centre for Economics and Ethics (CEE) is, among others, intended to support scientific research on the ethical aspects of economic activity.

Which GRI indicators/Standards have been addressed?

The GRI indicator addressed in this case is: G4-EC8: Significant indirect economic impacts, including the extent of impacts and the updated GRI Standard is: Disclosure 203-2 Significant indirect economic impacts

 

78% of the world’s 250 largest companies report in accordance with the GRI Standards

SustainCase was primarily created to demonstrate, through case studies, the importance of dealing with a company’s most important impacts in a structured way, with use of the GRI Standards. To show how today’s best-run companies are achieving economic, social and environmental success – and how you can too.

Research by well-recognised institutions is clearly proving that responsible companies can look to the future with optimism.

FBRH GRI Standards Certified and ISEP approved Sustainability Course | Venue: London LSE

By registering for the next 2-day FBRH GRI-Standards Certified and ISEP approved Course you will be taking the first step in gaining the many benefits of sustainability reporting.

 

References:

1) This case study is based on published information by the KU Leuven FEB, located at the link below. For the sake of readability, we did not use brackets or ellipses. However, we made sure that the extra or missing words did not change the report’s meaning. If you would like to quote these written sources from the original, please revert to the original on the Global Reporting Initiative’s Sustainability Disclosure Database at the link:

http://database.globalreporting.org/

2) http://www.fbrh.co.uk/en/global-reporting-initiative-gri-g4-guidelines-download-page

3) https://g4.globalreporting.org/Pages/default.aspx

4) https://www.globalreporting.org/standards/gri-standards-download-center/

Note to the KU Leuven FEB: With each case study we send out an email to your listed address in request for a comment on this case study. If you have not received such an email please contact us.

What are the material issues the organization has identified?

In its 2013-2014 Sustainability Report ETH Zurich identified a range of material issues, such as quality of research, knowledge transfer, talent attraction and retention, diversity, recycling and waste, personnel development, sustainable catering. Among these, cultivating sustainability-related competencies in students and staff stands out as a key material issue for ETH Zurich.

Stakeholder engagement in accordance with the GRI Standards

The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) defines the Principle of Stakeholder Inclusiveness when identifying material issues (or a company’s most important impacts) as follows:

“The organization should identify its stakeholders, and explain how it has responded to their reasonable expectations.”

Stakeholders must be consulted in the process of identifying a company’s most important impacts and their reasonable expectations and interests must be taken into account. This is an important cornerstone for CSR / sustainability reporting done responsibly.

Key stakeholder groups ETH Zurich engages with:   

Stakeholder Group

Vice Presidency for Research and Corporate Relations

Industry

Faculty (Professors)

Federal Parliament

Departments

ETH Domain

Competence centers

Swiss universities

Scientific staff

International universities

Funding agencies and organizations (Swiss National Science Foundation, Commission for Technology and Innovation, European Union etc.)

Rector

High schools

Rectorate

Study Commissions

Directors of Study

Students

ETH Global

Public administration

Corporate Communications

Public authorities

NGOs

Media

Vice Presidency for Human Resources and Infrastructure

Local neighborhoods of ETH Zurich at Campus Zentrum and Campus Hönggerberg

Local neighborhood to ETH Zurich in other locations in Switzerland and abroad

ETH Zurich Executive Board and Associate Vice Presidents

Secretary General

Staff Units

Infrastructure Divisions

Administrative and technical staff

Student organizations

Sports facilities

Catering facilities

Vice Presidency for Finance and Controlling

Tax payer

Finance and Controlling

Donors

Foundations

Other third-party funding

Alumni of ETH Zurich

How stakeholder engagement was made to identify material issues

To capture stakeholder perspectives on ETH Zurich’s material issues and explore stakeholders’ expectations, interviews with 21 representatives of stakeholder groups were conducted.

What actions were taken by ETH Zurich to cultivate sustainability-related competencies in students and staff?

In its 2013-2014 Sustainability Report ETH Zurich reports that it took the following actions for cultivating sustainability-related competencies in students and staff:

• Integrating sustainability across departments and degree programs
• ETH Zurich’s commitment to sustainability encompasses a number of courses and programs, such as the Department of Environmental System Sciences’ education programs, promoting sustainable development for more than 25 years.

• Encouraging students and staff to learn about sustainability through innovative activities and events
• Students and staff at ETH Zurich have the opportunity to better understand sustainable development issues through various activities and events, including the following:
  • The event series “Pioneers in Sustainability”, launched in 2013, offers students an opportunity to learn how to combine professional success with a commitment to sustainability.
  • The Energy Efficiency Challenge, in 2014, brought together more than 400 members of the ETH community, to suggest actions for improving energy efficiency at ETH Zurich.

• Offering summer and winter schools on sustainability
• ETH Zurich offers a number of summer and winter schools on sustainability topics, such as the ETH Sustainability Summer School, the World Food System Center’s three summer schools and the winter school of the Competence Center Environment and Sustainability (CCES).

• Bringing faculty and students working on sustainability-related theses into contact with private and public sector partners
• ETH Seed Sustainability is a project platform within which faculty and students working on sustainability-related theses are able to come into contact with partners from the private sector, public administration or other ETH Zurich units. In 2013 and 2014, 15 Bachelor’s and Master’s theses and one project thesis were written and finalized within ETH Seed Sustainability.

Which GRI indicators/Standards have been addressed?

The GRI indicator addressed in this case is: G4-EC8: Significant indirect economic impacts, including the extent of impacts and the updated GRI Standard is: Disclosure 203-2 Significant indirect economic impacts

 

78% of the world’s 250 largest companies report in accordance with the GRI Standards

SustainCase was primarily created to demonstrate, through case studies, the importance of dealing with a company’s most important impacts in a structured way, with use of the GRI Standards. To show how today’s best-run companies are achieving economic, social and environmental success – and how you can too.

Research by well-recognised institutions is clearly proving that responsible companies can look to the future with optimism.

FBRH GRI Standards Certified and ISEP approved Sustainability Course | Venue: London LSE

By registering for the next 2-day FBRH GRI-Standards Certified and ISEP approved Course you will be taking the first step in gaining the many benefits of sustainability reporting.

 

References:

1) This case study is based on published information by ETH Zurich, located at the link below. For the sake of readability, we did not use brackets or ellipses. However, we made sure that the extra or missing words did not change the report’s meaning. If you would like to quote these written sources from the original, please revert to the original on the Global Reporting Initiative’s Sustainability Disclosure Database at the link:

http://database.globalreporting.org/

2) http://www.fbrh.co.uk/en/global-reporting-initiative-gri-g4-guidelines-download-page

3) https://g4.globalreporting.org/Pages/default.aspx

4) https://www.globalreporting.org/standards/gri-standards-download-center/

Note to ETH Zurich: With each case study we send out an email to your listed address in request for a comment on this case study. If you have not received such an email please contact us.