CLC-Conference-Proceeding-2018

Role of Universities in the Creation of an Environmental Culture
for Sustainable Development: Experiences of the University of
Havana, Cuba.
Dr. Cristina Diaz Lopez
Within the framework of the Cultural and
Educational Development Program that has
engrossed the Cuban government for many
years, the subjects of the environment and
sustainable development have been two high
priority issues as related to the institutional
process of implementing a resulting
environmental policy by including the handling
of environmental problems to the country’s
developmental process and facing global
challenges imposed by climate change.
As a part of this process, Article 27 was
added to the Cuban Constitution in 1992, which
states, “The State protects the environment and
the country’s natural resources. It acknowledges
a close association between economic and
sustainable social development in order to make
human life more rational and ensure survival, the
wellbeing, and safety of current and future
generations…”
In 1994, the Ministry of Science,
Technology, and Environment was established,
and in 1997, the “National Environmental
Strategy” and the “National Environmental
Educational Strategy” were approved. The latter
is a programmatic document which states the
need for Cuban Higher Education to play a
protagonist role in developing an environmental
culture among our people as a premise to attain
the goals and objectives of sustainable
development.
The complex nature of the environmental
problem requires comprehensive reflection
where phenomena analyzed by completely
separate fields of knowledge converge.
The complexity of the environmental problem
includes taking natural and social phenomenon
into consideration and within these, the
cognitive, economic, political and ideological
phenomenon (1).
The Cuban Ministry of Higher Education
was created in 1976. Some of the Higher
Education institutions comprising it have a long
prior academic history, such as the University of
Havana, established in 1728, Universidad de
Oriente in 1947 and the Universidad Central de
las Villas in 1952. The remainder were
established subsequently
Regarding the University of Havana, the
number of students in the different
undergraduate programs has fluctuated in the last
few years between 17,000 and 20,000. They
receive curricular instruction and education on
the environment, which has been getting
progressively better since the Rio Earth Summit
in 1992.
Furthermore, they receive environmental
training and education through extracurricular
and informal channels through university
extension activities and some others promoted by
the Federación Estudiantil Universitaria
[University Student Federation] (FEU).
Regarding postgraduate activities, the
inclusion of an environmental dimension into all
Master’s Degree programs and majors in Cuban
Higher Education has been streamlined; and
transversally including this dimension into
research for doctoral dissertations is a priority.
University extension work, whose
explicit objectives include reaffirming