Stakeholder Engagement & Facilitation Pathway

What is a Pathway?

A pathway is a suite of courses that provides students with recommended skills, knowledge, and tools for a specific industry or career. This is not a specialization. Pathways can help students upon graduation when applying for jobs by calling attention to the relevant coursework they have undertaken in this space.

Students facilitating a workshop as a part of the Building Community Capacity course.
MENV now offers a Stakeholder Engagement & Facilitation Pathway (SEFP). A stakeholder is any individual, group, or organization that has an interest in an issue, is affected by the issue, and/or can influence the outcome of the issue in some way. Given the reach of sustainability challenges across environmental, social, and economic sectors alike, careers in sustainability will inherently require individuals who can identify, engage, and collaborate with many diverse groups and organizations. The goal of the SEFP is to learn how to identify key stakeholders and facilitate their collaborative engagement across various projects.

Students are not required to take all courses within the SEFP. Rather, they are welcome to choose those classes that are most relevant to them, so long as they take at least one Foundational Theory course and one Practice & Skills course. Four courses in total (12 credits) must be taken from the list below to complete the SEFP. To learn more about the SEFP, please feel free to reach out to the MENV Admissions team at MENVAdmissions@colorado.edu. 

Career Paths

MENV students obtain a variety of jobs post graduation. SEF is a skill required in most sustainability jobs, even if not explicitly stated in the title. Below is a small list of roles associated with this Pathway. You can see our sample list of Alumni Job Titles . 

  • Sustainability Specialist for local government
  • Community Consultant
  • Partnership Coordinator
  • Project Manager
  • Stakeholder Officer

 

Capstone Project Examples

 

Social Inclusion & Representation

Engaging stakeholders requires identification of all parties related to a project, and understanding their power dynamics, interest levels, and connections to each other.

 

 

Communication & Outreach Skills

Stakeholders have various levels of project awareness, interests, and goals, which may require various styles of communication and facilitation.

 

Justice & Ethics

Whose voice should be included? Stakeholder engagement offers a path towards highlighting the voices and needs of those who historically have been removed from decision-making processes and bringing them to the table. 

 

Meaningful Engagement

Stakeholder engagement should go beyond simply identifying and including stakeholders in conversations to meaningfully engaging them in the decision-making process, so they have the ability to actively influence decisions that are made. This requires thoughtful planning and consideration as to when to engage stakeholders and how, alongside whom.

 

Suggested Courses (Click "+" to view courses)

Foundational Theory
  • ENVM 5054: Stakeholder Engagement: Processes, Practices, and Politics 
  • ENVM 5013: Environmental Governance: Actors and Institutions
  • ENVM 5068: Qualitative Methods for Sustainability
  • ENVM 5065: Community Economic Development 
  • ENVM 5071: Facilitation for Change
  • ENVM 5070: Consulting in Practice
  • ENVM 5074: Conservation Management
  • ENVS 5100: Conflict Management & Collaboration 
  • ENVM 5067: Building Community Capacity 
  • ENVM 5040: URS Clinic 
  • ENVM 5022: Communicating for Sustainability & Impact 
  • ENVM 5071: Facilitation for Change
  • ENVM 5070: Consulting in Practice