Guest Post: Sustainable Development at the University Of St. Andrews

Connor Brownell is a freshman at The University of St. Andrews in Scotland.
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You know that old proverb that some wise person in your life would tell you after failing to achieve something at first, “If at first you don’t succeed, try try again?” Well I am fairly certain that my brother – the usual writer for this blog – has brought that phrase to a whole new level. After what has seemed to be 37 years of him harassing me to write for his blog, I finally accepted the challenge to write a post for Sustainabili-City.

So you’re probably intrigued by the fact that there is a new face on this blog to write articles and are wondering what I have to offer. Well frankly Colin and I are alike in many ways and… WHOA THERE, don’t give up and click out of the page. What I mean to say is he and I are strongly interested in sustainable development and the impact it has on our lives. We also have a superior appreciation for humor, so one could say it’s a privilege to read what occurs in our brilliant minds.

Now let’s cut the cute intro and get to the point. I believe that there is a crucial role for sustainability that sadly most people neglect to realize. The cause of this misjudgment is a current issue brings all types of people together to have mature and professional debates on whether sustainability is truly a threat to our planet*.

I can vouch to this since I am currently studying sustainable development at the University of St. Andrews. Four days a week at I go to a 9 a.m. lecture to learn about sustainable development. So far I have experienced many different incidents where there is a lot of skepticism towards sustainable development. My personal favourite is when we got into small groups and reflected about a current lecture. One of my fellow students took the time to talk about sustainable development and how he believed that it’s a waste of a major to study. Before you get all concerned, I didn’t do anything drastic or stupid at the time to vent my rage towards him. I looked at my WWCSD bracelet and focused my anger into thinking about how bi-winning I am.

What’s great about this blog is it enables people like you and me to share what we find and think about important issues that are affecting us or will in the near future. I plan on posting articles that reflect what I am experiencing here at St. Andrews or what I find elsewhere. There needs to be a thorough push to promote the education of sustainable development and what it entails. I hope to help ignite the spread of sustainable development education by writing here and sharing my thoughts. In the next couple of weeks I am going to be working on a behavior change assignment and what it takes to make people act in a more sustainable manner.

It’s been pretty interesting writing my first little blog post for Sustainabili-City. Next time I plan on having a more focused topic, so hopefully this wasn’t too long and hard for you to read**.


*A screaming competition is a closer statement but I like to give society the benefit of the doubt.

** Successful sexual joke.