Introduction: While current debates on higher education are concerned with “what are we actually teaching in Education for sustainable development“ (Kopnina and Meijers 2014) or “how can we evaluate what we teach“, there is a lack of research addressing how universities are enabling change and developing new higher education approaches. Dominant educational structures across the world are based on fragmentation rather than connections and synergy to achieve a holistic approaches to education for sustainability (Wals, 2009). Education for sustainability calls for new kinds of collective learning that are centered on a transmissive nature (i.e. learning as reproduction) but rather on a transformative nature (i.e. learning as change). Embodying an active care for sustainability on higher education implies having an education for sustainability that includes socialization for democratic skills and values, and the development of a personal- and collective sense of competence (Chawla and Flanders Cushing, 2007).

Objectives: The aim of this paper is to explore how a university create approaches on education for sustainability by engaging – or not its faculty and students, and how such approaches support or not authentic sustainable citizenship. To fulfil this purpose, we rely on theory of situated learning (Lave and Wenger, 1991) and communities of practices (Wenger, 2011) to move beyond static approaches to more dynamic approaches on education for sustainability.

Methods: We conducted a case study (Eisenhardt, 1989; Miles and Huberman, 1984; Yin 1984) to investigate how approaches to education for sustainability were changed and built in Jönkoping University. As the study progressed, there was a mixture of inductive and deductive research strategies. This means that theoretical development occurred by combining the perspectives and observation of actors with existing literature. We interviewed strategically chosen persons and analyzed official documents.

Results: The study revealed the processes for stimulating education for sustainability in a university that allowed each school to define freely its approach to sustainability. As a result, communities of practices stimulating situated learning were originated at the university. There were a myriad of ‘working’ approaches and degrees of prioritization on education for sustainability. Such approaches emerged following different rationales. In a bottom-up rationale, institutional entrepreneurs/faculty members and students created smaller communities of practices linked to their courses and activities. In a top-down rationale a school included principles promoting sustainability. Finally, a mix rationale moved in-between those approaches.

Conclusion: We propose that considering those rationales in a single university promotes communities of practice as well as authentic sustainable citizenship.