Education for Sustainable Development and Global Citizenship—The UK Perspective

2005 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 233-237 ◽  
Author(s):  
Douglas Bourn
2010 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 97-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sally Inman ◽  
Sophie Mackay ◽  
Maggie Rogers ◽  
Ros Wade

Effecting Change Through Learning Networks: The Experience of the UK Teacher Education Network for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and Global Citizenship (GC) The article discusses and evaluates the experience of the UK Teacher Education Network for education for sustainable development (ESD) and global citizenship (GC) as a community of practice dedicated to embedding ESD and GC across teacher education in the UK. The article sets out the global and UK policy context for ESD and GC and outlines the differing government support and guidance for ESD/GC within teacher education across the four nations of the UK. The development and activities of the Network as a community of practice are evaluated in relation to the original aims of the Network with respect to the development and sharing of good practice and the embedding of ESD/GC across teacher education in the UK. The article concludes by arguing that the Network is successful in the first of the aims as there is now a vibrant UK wide teacher education community of practice in ESD/GC whereby radical practice can be explored, questioned and shared. However, the rapidly changing government policy context for education particularly in England makes it difficult to predict how effectively the Network can affect policy change and/or long lasting change in course content so as to embed ESD/GC in teacher education across the UK. The authors suggest that the Network will need to work alongside new and existing alliances to try to convince policy makers of the critical need to ensure that new teachers are equipped to develop effective ESD/GC in schools.


2015 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Annette Gough ◽  
Noel Gough

AbstractThis article explores the changing ways ‘environment’ has been represented in the discourses of environmental education and education for sustainable development (ESD) in United Nations (and related) publications since the 1970s. It draws on the writings of Jean-Luc Nancy and discusses the increasingly dominant view of the environment as a ‘natural resource base for economic and social development’ (United Nations, 2002, p. 2) and how this instrumentalisation of nature is produced by discourses and ‘ecotechnologies’ that ‘identify and define the natural realm in our relationship with it’ (Boetzkes, 2010, p. 29). This denaturation of nature is reflected in the priorities for sustainable development discussed at Rio+20 and proposed successor UNESCO projects. The article argues for the need to reassert the intrinsic value of ‘environment’ in education discourses and discusses strategies for so doing. The article is intended as a wake-up call to the changing context of the ‘environment’ in ESD discourses. In particular, we need to respond to the recent UNESCO (2013a, 2013b) direction of global citizenship education as the successor to the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development 2005–2014 that continues to reinforce an instrumentalist view of the environment as part of contributing to ‘a more just, peaceful, tolerant, inclusive, secure and sustainable world’ (UNESCO, 2013a, p. 3).


Author(s):  
Francisco Parrança da Silva ◽  
Bruna F. Batista

The education of global citizens prepared to live with each other and one another in a fair, respectful and sustainable way has taken a high place at the heart of education systems, politics and practices in different parts of the world. This document presents a systematic review, carried through a survey of a cohort of articles that portray pedagogical practices of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and/or Global Citizenship of children (three-to-thirteen) in school context. For this systematic review three search phases/stages were performed/took place: a) definition of keywords, b) definition of exclusion and inclusion criteria, and c) construction of three tables that will serve the purpose of data collection for later analysis. A descriptive analysis will be carried out as a way of assessing which pillars of Sustainable Development (SD), sustainability themes, pedagogical strategies and key competences for SD are most representative in reported practices in early childhood education.


2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gavin Melles

PurposeIn the new Sustainability 2.0 era of education for sustainable development (ESD) transforming, curriculum remains a high interest topic, including in the UK. Among influential factors for progress, lecturer views on sustainable development and ESD in curriculum are important. In particular, the relationship between espoused views on sustainability and development and these views institutionalized into the curriculum require further investigation. Existing qualitative interview studies of lecturers identify a range of views about sustainable development and ESD but rarely focus on postgraduate environments nor use thematic discourse analysis.Design/methodology/approachThis active interview study enrolled a cohort of academics (n= 21) teaching into ten postgraduate UK taught masters degrees. Using active interviews and thematic discourse analysis, this study focused lecturer accounts of translating sustainable development into ESD, student attitudes and characteristics and course nature and content in relation to institutional, disciplinary, personal and other drivers and discourses. Thematic discourse analysis and NVivo 12 the study identified themes and discourses arising from the interview accounts.FindingsIn addition to identifying echoes of previously identified themes, this study focuses on the influence of interviewer–interviewee interaction and the interrelated nature of themes developed from 972 substantive codes. These themes identify the key influences as institutional, personal and disciplinary perspectives, institutional contrasts and tensions; pragmatic and passionate student characteristics; flexible sustainability principles and definitions; and social and personal ethics, ideology and equity, as key factors. Despite varying in length and depth, interviewees all show a deep appreciation for the challenges of defining and teaching sustainable development in complex institutional circumstances.Practical implicationsFaculty accounts of sustainable development and ESD practice depend on personal ethics and experiences, disciplinary discourses and institutional drivers and arrangements. Rather than focusing on simple categorizations of views in abstract, progress toward transformational ESD should acknowledge the need for dialogue about the importance of a plurality of views and discourses.Originality/valueThematic discourse analysis of a multi-institutional cohort affords closer analysis of contextual institutional and identity factors influencing approaches to HESD. Academic views cannot be easily subcategorized into broad conservative or radical positions. Final discussion of the relevance of institutional theory to sustainability change is also new.


2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 268-270
Author(s):  
Paul Pace

Since the inception of the concept of education for sustainable development (ESD) (UNCED, 1992, Chapter 36, par.3), higher education institutions (HEIs) have been considered key actors in its promotion. HEIs were expected to achieve this by leading students to contextualise their learning within the realities of their own specialisation, profession and personal life by encouraging them to develop: (a) the notion of global citizenship; (b) a commitment towards environmental stewardship; (c) a reflection about the interaction between issues of social justice, ethics, wellbeing and ecological and economic factors; and (d) a commitment towards actively ensuring sustainable futures (Longhurst, 2014, p.5).


Author(s):  
Karena Menzie-Ballantyne ◽  
Miriam Ham

Abstract In June 2020, an Australian Curriculum (AC) review was announced, particularly regarding content crowding in primary years, flexibility and deep understanding of core concepts. The language of the announcement highlighted again the ‘competing-priorities’ discourse that suggests a disjuncture between focusing on fundamental knowledge and skills of literacy and numeracy and providing opportunities to develop broader conceptual understandings and skills inherent in the pedagogies of education for global citizenship (EGC) and education for sustainable development (ESD). By contrast, the School Strike 4 Climate rallies exemplified students’ integration of knowledge, skills, values and attitudes from a variety of disciplines and broader learning experiences embedded within the AC with the cross-curriculum priorities, particularly sustainability, and the general capabilities. This article claims that the School Strike 4 Climate rallies highlight the interconnection between EGC and ESD and the AC. It will argue that the inquiry-based, pedagogical approaches of EGC and ESD are powerful integrators offering teachers the opportunity to take cross-disciplinary approaches to planning, connecting multiple learning areas from the AC with real-world projects and issues. It is suggested that, far from crowding the curriculum, such integration frees up space and offers opportunities for the deep conceptual understanding the curriculum review seeks.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
SDAG Lab

International initiatives on orientating education toward sustainable development can be traced back to a proposal by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1995. According to this framework, UNESCO suggested reorienting environmental education and reshaping the educational process so as to build a more sustainable relationship between humans and the environment. Twenty-five years have passed, and much of this pursuit is still ongoing, with many unanswered challenges. In recognition of the importance of education and sustainable development, this book brings into focus some valuable insights from the perspective of a developing country, Vietnam. It is a collected volume of academic contributions to the UNESCO 2019 Forum on Education for Sustainable Development and Global Citizenship, organized on July 2–3, 2019, by UNESCO in conjunction with the Ministry of Education Training (MOET) of Vietnam.


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