Climate change - ready or not
Professor Ian O'Connor
Thirty years ago the founders of Griffith University knew that the environment would be one of the key areas of the future and founded Australia's first university school of environmental studies.
Thirty years on the world is recognising the clarity of that vision as climate change becomes the common catchcry.
Emeritus Professor Ian Lowe OA, in addressing an Educational Leadership Series several years ago, spoke metaphorically of the fact that while we may not know which way the wind will blow, we can set the sails to travel in whichever direction we wish to go.
Griffith set its sails thirty years ago on environmental sustainability and now world events have confirmed its essential role in dealing with the cataclysmic effects of climate change. The recent initiative of the Griffith University Climate Change Response Program will use Griffith's famed interdisciplinary approach and long-standing environmental record to research and develop practical tools to respond to the multiple impacts of climate change. Across a wide range of disciplines, the Program will tackle issues as diverse as protecting our coastline and addressing the legal risks of climate change. At the same time we continue to develop other important initiatives such as the Australian Rivers Institute and the Gold Coast's Smart Water Facility.
Sustainability is perhaps a concept that some still see as an 'environmental' issue but as even the naysayers accept that global warming has been at least partially created by human activity, it becomes clear that we are all agents of change, regardless of our area of study or our profession. The Griffith Business School is helping change the dominant paradigm for business success by recognising that financial viability must work in tandem with social and environmental sustainability.The business school is trying to practise what it preaches by minimising the environmental footprint from its own operations.
We have just welcomed the next generation of students to our campuses and I look forward to seeing them carry on and further develop these traditions of sustainability. My wish for their futures - and ours too - is that a Griffith education gives them the tools to find solutions to the climate change challenge, whatever their discipline.