Defining sustainability in terms that young students understand is also critically important for the success of this curriculum. Sustainability was defined in 1987 as “development that meets the needs of the present, without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
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This language is not accessible for young school children and it needs to be explained in a way that they can understand and discuss. Sustainability can be explained to children as maintaining the world that we live in. Engineering has played a large role in maintaining and improving upon lifestyles since the industrial revolution. We have become accustomed to certain luxuries and lifestyles and would not want to harm the status of our communities by doing something that would drastically change these things. Sustainability is often brought up when thinking of environmental engineering because we want the planet to sustain life for many years to come. This is a concept that students can identify and relate with. Students can understand, comprehend, and discuss why taking care of the environment and world around them is important. They understand that they must do things such as recycle, participate in clean up days, and complete small tasks like shutting lights and water off when they are not using them to help the environment. We can push this one step further and ask students to create prototypes that make their own communities more sustainable. How can we make our society more sustainable for the future?