At the University of Cape Town, there is a clear and growing institutional commitment to sustainability education, reflecting SDG consciousness across student life, teaching, and campus engagement. Key signals of this commitment come from UCT’s Vision 2030, its sustainability strategy, campus projects, and the inclusion of sustainability learning in co-curricular and curricular activities.

  1. Vision 2030 and Institutional Strategy
    UCT’s Vision 2030 explicitly anchors sustainability as one of its three “fundamental pillars” — alongside excellence and transformation — which provides a strategic foundation for embedding SDG themes across the university.

    UCT’s Acting Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Research and Internationalisation is quoted:
    “Our work as a university is rooted in ensuring a sustainable and equitable future for all … this initiative brings together academics, professional staff and students to collaboratively develop, test and implement sustainable solutions …”
  2. Sustainable Campus as a Living Lab
    In October 2024, UCT ran a Sustainable Campus Guided Walking Tour, initiated by the African Climate & Development Initiative (ACDI), as part of the Khusela Ikamva (“Secure the Future”) campus project.
    • This tour, designed for both students and staff, highlights real sustainability infrastructure on campus (e.g., water dams, waste systems) and prompts reflection on resource use.
    • One installation — “Flush and go or flush and grow” — used a toilet placed in a plaza to provoke thinking about water, waste, and sanitation, linking to SDG 6 (clean water) and broader sustainability behavior.
    • The fact that this is student-led (Future Water Institute) underscores that UCT is not just teaching in classrooms, but embedding SDG-relevant learning in the living, physical campus. This kind of “living lab” pedagogy is a strong indicator of meaningful, experiential SDG education accessible to all students.
  3. Participation in System-Level Sustainability Networks
    UCT is a member of the Universities South Africa Higher Education Sustainability Community of Practice (HESCoP), helping to shape national higher-education sustainability agendas.
    • At a 2023 AGM hosted at UCT, the director of Environmental Sustainability (Manfred Braune) and other leaders emphasized teaching, learning, research, and community engagement relating to sustainability as core components.
    • Through HESCoP, UCT helps develop policy and capacity that ensures sustainability (and thus SDG) literacy is part of institutional governance, not just isolated “green” programs.
  4. Teaching & Leadership Programs Embed SDG / ESG Concepts
    UCT offers programmes and modules that integrate social impact, community engagement, and sustainable development in their curricula:
    • The UCT Graduate School of Business (GSB) runs a course “Fundamentals of Community Engagement and Social Impact Leadership,” which teaches ESG (environmental, social, governance) frameworks, stakeholder engagement, and social impact management.
    • Moreover, the UCT GSB MBA explicitly weaves sustainability and SDG-relevant leadership into its core core teaching: in a 2025 news piece, the GSB stated that “sustainability and responsible leadership are woven through every aspect of our MBA … from our core courses to the … Responsible Citizenship module.”

  5. Signatory to the 2019 U7+ Alliance of World Universities Presidential Declaration

    UCT is a signatory to this declaration, which set out six principles that universities commit to:

    Collective response to global challenges – Universities recognise their shared will to identify and respond to contemporary global challenges, and commit to joint action via the U7+ (including annual meetings aligned with the G7 process).

    Education of responsible citizens – Universities acknowledge their special responsibility to educate and nurture engaged, responsible citizens who will contribute at both local and global levels.

    Environmental & sustainability leadership – Universities recognise a major role in addressing environmental issues (e.g., climate change, biodiversity, energy transition), including by leading through example on their own campuses.

    Access, inclusion and combating polarization – Universities commit to widening access to education, promoting inclusion/opportunity, and fostering respectful and evidence-based public debate to counter societal polarization.

    Interdisciplinary research and learning – Universities recognise that to engage stakeholders and solve complex global issues they must promote interdisciplinary research and learning, bridging social sciences, humanities, life sciences, STEM.

    Sharing best practices & global network function – The U7+ views itself as a “laboratory” to consolidate best practices, which can be shared within the network and more broadly across universities worldwide.