Universities on Fire: Academia Confronts the Climate Crisis in the Polycrisis with Dr. Bryan Alexander

The School of the Environment, the OISE Library, and OISE's Sustainability & Climate Action Network (SCAN) invite you to join us for the keynote lecture of the 2026 Sustainability Thinking Exhibition, Universities on Fire: Academia Confronts the Climate Crisis in the Polycrisis with Dr. Bryan Alexander. The lecture will be held on on Tuesday, March 3rd, 2026, from 3:30 - 5:00 PM in classroom OI G162 (252 Bloor St W, Toronto, ON M5S 1V6). For detailed instructions on how to find the classroom, please see here.

The Sustainability Thinking Exhibition features work from University of Toronto students across the tri-campus. The exhibition is an exploration of sustainability topics and environmental issues through the arts, including visual and installation art, digital media, music, and other forms of creative communication. This year's theme for the exhibition is "Navigating the Planetary Crisis through the Arts: The University and the Polycrisis." 

To attend the keynote lecture, and see what other events are happening as part of the 2026 exhibition, please RSVP below.

Register Now!

Note: If you have any questions, or require any accommodations, please contact the Exhibition Coordinator, Michela McMurrich, at events.environment@utoronto.ca. 

About the Lecture

How might academics act on climate change while the global polycrisis ratchets up? In this futures presentation we begin by sketching out what polycrisis means in 2026, then situate the multiple levels of university climate engagement: teaching, research, campus operations, and public scholarship. Next we explore ways by which post-secondary climate work might change over the next two decades, dwelling on the AI revolution and divergent attitudes concerning progress. We conclude with a call to action in difficult times.

About the Speaker

Bryan Alexander is an award–winning, internationally known futurist, researcher, writer, speaker, consultant, and teacher, working in the field of higher education’s future.

He completed his English language and literature PhD at the University of Michigan in 1997, with a dissertation on doppelgangers in Romantic-era fiction and poetry. teaching at Centenary CollegeThen Bryan taught literature, writing, multimedia, and information technology studies at Centenary College of Louisiana. There he also pioneered multi-campus interdisciplinary classes, while organizing an information literacy initiative.

From 2002 to 2014 Bryan worked with the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE), a non-profit working to help small colleges and universities best integrate digital technologies. With NITLE he held several roles, including co-director of a regional education and technology center, director of emerging technologies, and senior fellow. Over those years Bryan helped develop and support the nonprofit, grew peer networks, consulted, and conducted a sustained research agenda. In 2013 Bryan launched a business, Bryan Alexander Consulting, LLC. Through BAC he consults throughout higher education in the United States and abroad.

Bryan speaks widely and publishes frequently, with articles appearing in venues including The Atlantic Monthly, Inside Higher Ed. He has been interviewed by and featured in the New York Times, the Washington Post, MSNBC, the Wall Street Journal, US News and World Report, National Public Radio (2017, 2020, 2020, 2020, 2020), Marketplace, the Chronicle of Higher Education (2016, 2020), the Atlantic Monthly, Reuters, Times Higher Education, the National Association of College and University Business Officers, Pew Research, Campus Technology, The Hustle, Minnesota Public Radio, USA Today, and the Connected Learning Alliance.

Bryan’s book Academia Next: The Futures of Higher Education (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2020), won an Association of Professional Futurists award. His Universities on Fire: Higher Education in the Age of Climate Crisis appeared in 2023 and won the 2025 Frederic W. Ness Book Award. His new book, Peak Higher Ed: How to Survive the Emerging Academic Crisis, appeared in January 2026. His other books include Gearing Up For Learning Beyond K-12 and The New Digital Storytelling (second edition).

Bryan is currently a senior scholar at Georgetown University and teaches graduate seminars in their Learning, Design, and Technology program.