Social and Environmental Ethics Integrated into Management Curricula

Throughout the last two decades, a wave of studies criticizing current curricula have swept through the field of management, leading to the discussion of widespread reforms throughout educational institutions. Specifically, many criticized the lack of “functionally integrated curricula in higher education,” one that is inclusive of social and ecological factors in business practices. In light of this, the Desautels Faculty of Management created the Marcel Desautels Institute for Integrated Management (MDIIM) in 2008, following a generous $10 million donation from Marcel Desautels.

In 2011, after much deliberation, McGill appointed Dr. Steve Maguire to be the Institute’s first director. Today, the MDIIM is not only up and running, but incredibly active. This is seen by the recent string of events surrounding the importance of management practices in ecological sustainability, highlighted by a guest appearance by Linda Lear, the renowned author of Rachel Carson’s autobiography.

Adam Halpert, the Institute’s Managing Director, gave us a glimpse of the novel Faculty Fellow Program that seeks to appoint a number of Desautels faculty members to “scope, design and implement innovative teaching, research and outreach initiatives around the MDIIM’s thematic priorities” over a two year period. Halpert also mentioned that future plans would promote more student-based research initiatives at Desautels, the funding for which could come directly from Desautels or from facilitated external agreements.

Read full article: The Bull and Bear, September 29, 2012