Preliminary Research into Education for Sustainability in Cultural Heritage Conservation

Researchers and practitioners of cultural heritage conservation are increasingly aware of the field’s impact on the physical and social environment. Faculty at the UCLA/Getty Program in the Conservation of Cultural Heritage are working to support the next generation of researchers and practitioners to become leaders in adapting conservation for the climate crisis and addressing social inequity. This paper presents the first stage of an initiative to develop models for embedding sustainable practices into conservation education and producing scalable curricula for broad dissemination. In this first phase, we performed literature reviews, canvassed the field through surveys, conducted interviews and developed curricula for our laboratories and classrooms. Survey results indicate a high international interest in incorporating sustainability principles in cultural heritage education, but with a corollary challenge of being unable to substitute new concepts for those already taught. Literature reviews and interviews introduced the authors to existing pedagogical approaches for embedding sustainability within our courses. Sustainability concepts such as the Three Pillars of Sustainability, the United Nations Global Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and the Inform, Engage, Empower and Embed (I3E) systems provide guidance in our teaching. The next phase of the initiative will involve a close evaluation of pedagogical systems for integrating sustainability into the existing curriculum to ensure that emerging professionals in art conservation, built heritage, libraries, archives, archaeology and historic preservation will prioritize intersectional environmentalism. A future goal is to disseminate educational models broadly for adaptation by others.