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April 14, 2026
Dissertation Defense: Jason Slipp
schedule10:00am - 12:00pm
The College of Education has scheduled the final oral examination of Jason Slipp for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Teaching, Learning, and Technology. The title of the dissertation is An Investigation into the Components of Transformative Sustainability Education in Higher Education.
This journal-ready dissertation addresses this implementation gap through two integrated manuscripts. Manuscript One, a scoping review of transformative learning in sustainability education, systematically mapped and assessed the empirical literature. It validated the
conceptual framework of TSE and formally articulated the critical gap, which was synthesized into three essential pedagogical design components: Prerequisites, Inner Development, and Transferability. Manuscript Two, an investigative qualitative study, directly targets this gap. It utilizes an interpretive research paradigm to explore the intentional course design practices of faculty across the three components to provide essential pedagogical insights. Data is collected through an online questionnaire, semi-structured interviews, focus groups, and course artifacts.
Ultimately, this research provides a practice-based design framework for faculty, advances transformative learning theory by grounding it in sustainability design, and strengthens HEIs’ capacity to reliably cultivate the transformative competencies required for sustainability leadership.
