Exploring the Antecedents and Consequences of a Sustainable and Environmentally Friendly University Based on a Mixed Approach

This study aimed to explore the antecedents and consequences of a sustainable and environmentally friendly university using a mixed approach. This research is in the category of exploratory and applied research and the inductive deductive (mixed) approach. The statistical population of the research consists of fifteen experts, professors of higher education and environmental experts active at universities. To collect information in the qualitative part of the research, in-depth (semi-structured) interviews were conducted and in the quantitative part, a structured researcher-made questionnaire was used, the validity and reliability were confirmed by content validity and retesting. In the qualitative part, the data obtained from the interview were analyzed using Atlas TIA software and the content analysis method. Additionally, in the quantitative part of the research, using the fuzzy Delphi technique, the prerequisites and the extractive prerequisites were confirmed and prioritized. The findings of the study indicated the extraction of 7 antecedents and 7 postpositions, among which there were supportive, legal, and sustainable policy-making contexts, as well as organizing ideological, structural, environmental, functional, managerial, and sustainable evaluation requirements and the existence of a government support platform and a sustainable financing system, and among the consequences, a sustainable education system; sustainable research system and community cooperation with universities had the highest priority in solving environmental problems respectively.