Institution and Partner Organisations

• TU Dublin
• Good Clothes Fair Pay Campaign – European Citizen Initiative https://citizens-initiative.europa.eu/initiatives/details/2022/000004_en
• Fashion Revolution https://www.fashionrevolution.org/

Description

Higher education institutions have a vital role in advancing global citizenship mindsets and well-articulated student voices as a lever for social and economic change. Not only does student activism represent a meaningful contribution to society, research (Winston, 2013) suggests that it helps a student to look at life globally and not myopically. Furthermore, it can underpin the development of critical skills such as emotional intelligence, enhanced interpersonal effectiveness, the ability to collaborate with others across diverse perspectives, and a greater sense of self-efficacy with respect to having a positive impact on individuals, organisations and communities (Bernacki and Jaeger, 2008).

The initiative aimed to develop sustainability and global citizenship competences in undergraduate business students using authentic assessment (Farrell, 2020) which involves the development of ‘real world’ tasks in meaningful contexts. The initiative and associated assignments were aimed at developing a range of competences set out in the EU GreenComp framework.

Three lecturers worked together to design three separate assignments drawing on one real-world campaign. Good Clothes Fair Pay (Fashion Revolution, 2024) was a grassroots campaign led by garment industry NGOs and activists, including the Clean Clothes Campaign and Fashion Revolution. Using the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI), it called on the European Commission to propose legislation requiring brands and retailers in the garment sector to conduct due diligence to ensure payment of living wages to garment workers across their supply chains. Some students were taking more than one of the electives so they engaged with the same campaign in two different modules. The assignment briefs were co-designed but each was distinct in its aims and objectives in line with the specific learning outcomes associated with each module.

The initiative was scaffolded through a number of mechanisms including; publication of a RTÉ Brainstorm article (McAlpine et al., 2022) which served to introduce the campaign and hosting an expert panel discussion to familiarise students with the context. A previous online faculty seminar with Nasreen Sheikh, a former child labourer in the fashion industry, was also shared to scaffold learning.

• The Sustainable Supply Chain Management assignment required students to take an investigative role by choosing a piece of their own clothing, taking note of information on the garments label and plotting that piece of clothing’s supply chain. After identifying the country of manufacture, students investigated the labour conditions of that garment production region. Following this, students made a video documenting the results of their investigation. The video included the QR code for the GCFP campaign which they shared on TikTok, IG, LinkedIn. This assignment developed the GreenComp competences: supporting fairness, exploratory thinking, individual initiative.
• The Business Sustainability assignment required students to choose a business sustainability issue that related to the GCFP campaign (e.g. consequences of ultra-fast fashion) and to create social media content outlining the issue with a clear call to action (behavioural changes, signing the petition). This assignment developed the GreenComp competences: supporting fairness, political agency, political action.
• The Consumer Behaviour assignment required students to envision the future of clothing consumption in the year 2050. They completed a futures literacy template and created an infographic depicting their response to the task with an accompanying voiceover and bibliography. This assignment developed the GreenComp competences: Futures Literacy, adaptability and Self-awareness.

Collaboration, Partnerships & Student Participation

The students were at the heart of this assignment, which aimed to enhance their sustainability and global citizenship competences. They actively engaged in critically investigating and evaluating key issues related to the campaign, while creating digital artefacts designed to inspire greater awareness and action among others. Through these activities, the students strengthened their sense of agency and developed their capacity for informed activism.

Several external collaborations further strengthened the assessment design and successful delivery of the assignment, for example:

• Collaboration with Fashion Revolution: This organisation led the ‘Good Clothes, Fair Pay’ campaign. Maeve Galvin contributed to an online panel discussion on fast fashion and supply chains, co-authored an article for RTÉ Brainstorm, and Mairi Lowe from Fashion Revolution Scotland co-presented at the Communicating Sustainability conference at the University of Glasgow.
• Collaboration with industry experts: To support the assignment’s learning scaffolding, students also engaged with Kellie Dalton, sustainability strategist and responsible fashion advisor, and Malú Colorín, founding member of Fibreshed Ireland, who shared insights into working conditions and pay within the fashion industry.

Intended Learning Outcomes

Sustainable Supply Chain module

The learner will be able to demonstrate an understanding of how to mitigate the social and environmental impact of logistics activities as well as end of life management.

Consumer Behaviour module

The learner will be able to reflect on personal and societal consumption practices in relation to the requirements of moving to a Net-Zero emissions world by 2050.

Business Sustainability module

The learner will be able to demonstrate transformation in sustainability literacy – knowledge, skills and mindsets to become committed to building a more sustainable future – and its application to the business sector.

The learner will make evidence-based recommendations that will influence future of business education and practice that will contribute to and accelerate achievement of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

Teaching and Learning Approach

The initiative was underpinned by the GreenComp Framework and Authentic Assessment (real-world) design. A four-step methodology to enhance sustainability literacy among students and to embed sustainability education into teaching, learning and assessment practices underpinned the overall approach.

1. Students complete Sulitest, the UN supported sustainability literacy self-awareness test.
2. Students are required to write a reflection on the experience of completing the test.
3. Students engage in a real-world assignment linked to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and create shareable digital artefacts, for example, videos, infographics, podcasts which can be shared with the wider academic and business and societal community through social media platforms including LinkedIn and Instagram.
4. Students develop a call to action which they use to promote engagement with their digital artefact.

Assessment Strategy

Deliverables across all three assignments comprised a range of elements including; written reports, completed templates, bibliographies, voiced infographics, social media content (visuals and videos) and reflections.

Detailed evaluative rubrics were shared with students at the outset of the initiative. Rubrics were designed to closely align with the GreenComp framework. Students needed to demonstrate knowledge (written submissions substantiated by academic citations), skills (demonstrated ability to contextualise learning and apply it to the case at hand to develop digital artefacts) and attitudes (display of action through sharing artefacts online and articulating calls for action and/ or behaviour change). Marks were spread across the rubric to ensure all elements of the various assignments were accounted for in the marking scheme.

Impact and Outcomes

• Students’ online artefacts received thousands of likes and shares for the ‘Good Clothes, Fair Pay’ campaign call to action
• RTE Brainstorm article -opinion piece ‘Can a new campaign help garment makers to be paid fairly?’ written by McAlpine, A., Dalton, K. and Galvin, M. at the launch of the GCFP in September 2022
• ‘Good Clothes, Fair Pay’ campaign and proposed authentic assessment approach was co-presented with Fashion Revolution Scotland member Mairi Lowe at ‘Communicating Sustainability’ Conference in University of Glasgow in September 2022 (50 attendees)
• TU Dublin ConnectED  Seminar Series online event ‘Sustainability across the supply chain: The EU Citizen initiative on Living Wages with Maeve Galvin (Global Policy and Campaigns Director at Fashion Revolution), Kellie Dalton (sustainability strategist and responsible fashion advisor) and Malú Colorín (founding member of Fibreshed Ireland) moderated by Alacoque McAlpine (TU Dublin) 200 participants
• Presentation of the initiative at TU Dublin Faculty Research Day June 2023 (80 attendees)
• Workshop delivered to 52 class primary school children on impact of fast fashion on workers & the environment

Student Engagement

200 undergraduate students in the Faculty of Business, TU Dublin

Discipline

Business, Administration and Law

Programmes

• Sustainable Supply Chain Management module – BSc in Business and Management (Year 4), BSc in Logistics & Supply Chain Management (Year 4)
• Business Sustainability module – BSc in Business and Management (Year 4) and BSc in Marketing (Year 3)
• Consumer Behaviour module – BSc in Business and Management (Year 4)

Best Practices & Resources

Top Tips

• Real-world engagement – engage students in real-world campaigns to help them experience the power of individual and collective action. This approach enables learners to gain and practise sustainability and global citizenship competences, see the impact of their voices, and express their ideas creatively through platforms that resonate with them (e.g. TikTok, Instagram, LinkedIn)
• Scaffolding – authentic assessment works best when students are supported through well-designed learning scaffolds that help deepen and broaden knowledge and mindset. This can include guest lectures, curated online resources (such as sustainability literacy awareness like Sulitest) and reference materials like podcasts, academic papers, and documentaries that bring theory to life.
• Formative feedback – integrate structured feedback opportunities at key milestones so students can reflect, refine, and stay on track. Ongoing dialogue with the lecturer throughout the process fosters deeper learning and stronger outcomes in high-stakes, authentic assessments.

Useful Resources

• GreenComp – EU Green Competency Framework https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/greencomp-european-sustainability-competence-framework_en
• ‘Sustainable Fashion: Insights from Industry’ talk with Nasreen Sheikh, former child labourer in fashion industry https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=FdBJfKthmFM
• McAlpine, A., Dalton, K. and Galvin, M. (2022) Can a new campaign help garment makers to be paid fairly?, RTE Brainstorm https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2022/0718/1310895-good-clothes-fair-pay-campaign-garment-workers/

Funding Details

Funded by the Strategic Alignment of Teaching and Learning Enhancement (SATLE) Impact “Synergies” and “Accelerate” Schemes through TU Dublin, supported by the Higher Education Authority (HEA)