The Involvement of Public Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in Poland in the Promotion of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the Age of Social Media

The aim of this paper is to present the involvement of public Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in Poland in promoting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2021. The reason for undertaking the research was a noticeable lack of studies in the literature on the engagement of universities in the concept of sustainability. The research conducted was mainly qualitative in nature. The aim was realized using three groups of research methods: collection of empirical data, data processing, and the presentation of study outcomes. The study used 16 indicators, constructed from data taken from SciVal and RAD-on reports. These indicators presented the number of publications promoting each of the SDGs in 2021 per academic staff and other persons carrying out and participating in teaching or research activities. The research was conducted on 57 universities from Poland. Four clusters were distinguished as a result of the cluster analysis that was performed. The first cluster comprised only universities of life sciences. This group had the highest publication productivity for the following goals: SDG2, SDG3, SDG6, SDG11, SDG12, SDG13, SDG14, SDG15, and SDG16. The universities that made up cluster 2 (predominantly universities of technology) specialized in publications related to goals such as SDG7 and SDG9. The highest publication productivity for SDG1, SDG4, SDG5, SDG8, SDG10, and SDG16 belonged to cluster 3 (consisting mainly of universities of economics). The HEIs (mainly universities of physical education) that made up cluster 4 did not have the highest publication productivity in any of the SDGs. Therefore, it can be concluded that, in 2021, there was a correlation between the profile of a public HEI in Poland and the SDGs it was involved in promoting.