Sustainability accounting education: Scale, scope and a global need

Sustainability practice and reporting is gaining momentum due to the concerns and pressures arising from the Global Climate Change (GCC), limitation of resources, changed stakeholder preferences and expectations. Accounting degrees convey traditional, technical and narrowly defined knowledge with limited scope for non conventional approaches. Sustainability accounting education has the potential to allow departure from the conventional thinking and practice in accounting education. Sustainability educated graduates are being increasingly expected by business and industry as sustainability education allows the fostering of ¿soft skills¿ that conventional accounting courses do not address. In spite of these potentials and needs for sustainability accounting education, less than a quarter of Australian and United States accounting faculties are offering a stand alone sustainability accounting course. There is a degree of uniformity in relation to course content with majority of focus on internal and external sustainability reporting. Other areas such as sustainability history in the context of accounting are not included in the courses. Sustainability is a complex area that needs more serious attention in accounting schools in order to match graduate attributes with the increasing industry demands.