Education for sustainability (EfS) is recognised by institutions such as UNESCO, national education acts and higher education as of key importance. Business schools have been implementing the UN’s sustainable development goals, creating organisations such as the PRME. Support for implementing an advanced EfS is on demand. To plan education for sustainability, teachers need to know the students’ level of competencies for sustainability before they come to class to incorporate a learning progression approach. Thus, a formative assessment about student competence for sustainability is needed. This study provides a validation of a Sustainability Competence Assessment tool.
Questionnaire scales that measure sustainability competence have been tested in prior research, but much work is required to validate the scales. We have designed an assessment tool that includes all eight key sustainability competencies (KSC). Several statistical tests (Hair et al. 2019; Lans, Blok, and Wesselink 2014) have been conducted to validate the sustainability competencies scales with participants at a university business school, comparing results across modules and programs. Results show there is some validity in using all eight KSC, but more investigation is needed to improve the tool’s validity.