Charles Hopkins

Moving Beyond the EE and ESD Disciplinary Debate in Formal Education

Many educators think of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) on a disciplinary level—what is Environmental Educations (EE) contribution to a more sustainable future? Briefly, we describe differences and similarities between EE and ESD. Next, we examine four levels of activity—disciplinary, whole school, educational system, and international—that are necessary for progress in ESD. At the disciplinary level we outline some of the contributions of geography and workplace education to ESD. At the international level, we describe three transboundary educational issues—HIV/AIDS, education of girls and women, and education for and about refugees—which require multinational responses. It is apparent that more than a disciplinary approach to ESD is needed in the formal sector. Effort on all four levels and cooperation between levels is important for education to fulfil its role of moving communities and nations toward a more sustainable future.

Education for Sustainable Development: past experience., present action and future prospects

In his address to the American Council on Education, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has identified education as ‘a global priority’. He speaks of sustainability in terms of human security. ‘Our definition of security must encompass economic well-being, social justice, environmental protection, good governance and the rule of law.’ Annan goes on to say, ‘Education is the principal agent in efforts to build the pillars of human security’ (United Nations, 1997). In the early 1990s, the province of Ontario, Canada, mandated every school board to create ‘outcomes based’ curricula. The mandate essentially required the entire curriculum of the Board of Education for the City of Toronto to be rewritten. The following account is an example of revision of a formal curriculum and the accompanying school board reform that covered many of the attributes that theoreticians of education for sustainable development (ESD) describe as essential assets in re-orientating education systems to address sustainability. Five of these essential assets of re-orientation include:

Twenty Years of Education for Sustainable Development

As with many global movements, it is almost impossible to identify the exact origin of education for sustainable development (ESD). Each of us in the fi eld has a story of our initial reaction when and where we fi rst became aware of it. The emergence and evolution of a concept may only be relevant to scholars or devoted practitioners, but these stories should be recorded so that future generations can understand our thinking, as they improve on it. Our attempt to recognise the needs and rights of future generations—through the concept of sustainable development— and our attempts to alter our social, economic and environmental practices is a story worth retelling.

Reflections on 20+ Years of ESD.

As one of 12 members of the drafting committee of Agenda 21’s Chapter 36, ‘Education, Public Awareness and Training’, Charles Hopkins reflects on the process of working on the now-famous document. Although it was noncontroversial at the time, Chapter 36 spawned education for sustainable development when it was given to UNESCO to administer within the UN system. Hopkins chronicles how UNESCO struggled to establish an identity for ESD, separate from environmental education and the other related ‘adjectival education’ approaches, to infuse all education through a series of reports, assessments, guides and the Decade of Education for Sustainable Development.

International Network of Teacher Education Institutions: past, present and future

This paper examines the history, activities and future interests of the UNITWIN/UNESCO Chair on Reorienting Teacher Education to Address Sustainability and the associated International Network (IN) of Teacher Education Institutions. In 1998, the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development work programme on education for sustainable development (ESD) requested UNESCO to develop guidelines for reorienting teacher training to address sustainability. This responsibility was passed to the UNITWIN/NESCO Chair who established the IN. Participants recorded their efforts in journals, chronicling successes and failures. In 2004, IN members were sent a survey requesting information about what worked, what did not work and insights and recommendations for other institutions of teacher education. The responses were synthesized in Guidelines and recommendations for reorienting teacher education to address sustainability. Several UN agencies and regional offices have incorporated these Guidelines into their efforts. Members of the IN are now engaging other institutions of teacher education through workshops and mentoring to reorient teacher education.

Contributions of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) to Quality Education: A Synthesis of Research.

This research is a synthesis of studies carried out in 18 countries to identify contributions of education for sustainable development (ESD) to quality education. Five common questions were used for the interviews in each country to solicit education leaders and practitioners’ views on the outcome and implementation of ESD. The analysis revealed that major themes repeated across the 18 studies, showing that ESD contributes in many ways to quality education in primary and secondary schools. Teaching and learning transforms in all contexts when the curriculum includes sustainability content, and ESD pedagogies promote the learning of skills, perspectives and values necessary to foster sustainable societies. The research also identified the need to integrate ESD across all subjects, to provide professional development for teachers to ensure ESD policy implementation and to adopt ESD management practices to support ESD in the curriculum in order to broaden ESD across countries.

Education for Sustainable Development in Formal Education in Canada

This chapter opens with a description of the Canadian context for education for sustainable development (ESD), including formal education being the responsibility of the provinces and territories, not the federal government. It gives a short history of ESD in Canada prior to the advent of the United Nations of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD). The DESD stimulated ESD-related activities in formal education, notably by the Canadian Commission for UNESCO as well as within ministries of education, higher education, and K-12 education. After years of misinterpretation of intent of ESD, acceptance and implementation are growing. ESD is seen as a factor in addressing such core education issues as low student intellectual engagement in secondary school and quality of education for aboriginal students. While Canada’s overall PISA scores are quite high, there are questions arising regarding the appropriateness of the traditional curriculum. Efforts in Manitoba to reflect sustainability in K-12 education and efforts by the Sustainability and Education Academy to provide in-service professional development opportunities to school systems are highlighted.

Road to Ahmedabad: Embedding Environmental Wisdom in Our Cultural DNA.

In his speech at the inaugural session of the 4th International Conference on Environmental Education, Ahmedabad, India, in November 2007, Charles Hopkins, one of the ‘founding fathers’ of environmental education (EE) at the 1st International Conference on Environmental Education in Tbilisi, Georgia, in 1977, reflected on how EE has progressed over the past three decades. When the International Environmental Education Programme (IEEP) was born in the 1970s, pollution and the emerging scarcity of resources were the paramount issues, but those issues have now faded in the face of global poverty, climate change and economic issues. However, the architects of the early EE documents, including the well-crafted Tbilisi Declaration, envisioned many aspects of EE—including poverty eradication, cultural pre-servation and social justice—that are relevant today. Looking back, it is interesting to observe how environmental educators themselves have risen to the broad dreams of the Tbilisi Declaration writers.

Scope and Impact of Global Actions under UNDESD.

As the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development ends, there will be celebrations and the inevitable reporting on activities and outcomes. Countless meetings, events, and sessions have occurred around the world. This opinion piece acknowledges three significant events or outcomes that are shaping the future of ESD within formal education on a global scale. For this author, the first major outcome was the UNESCO World Conference in Bonn (2009) where representatives from most influentially significant ministries of education discussed and planned the future of ESD. The second was the movement conceptually of ESD from the periphery to a core component of quality education. The third was the concept of ESD more as a purpose of education comprised of not only curriculum content but new approaches to pedagogy. In closing the determination of nations to launch the new Global Action Programme is a testimony of the success of the UNDESD.

Beyond the Decade: The Global Action Program for Education for Sustainable Development

After the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development comes to a close; the Global Action Program (GAP) for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) will begin. The GAP has ESD five priority areas: advancing policy, transforming learning and training environments, building capacities of educators and trainers, empowering and mobilizing youth, and accelerating solutions at local level. The aim of the GAP is to make ESD widespread. This article describes challenges that accompany this aim.