Sustainable Education: Revisioning Learning and Change
The Schumacher Society, publishers of this briefing by Stephen Sterling, describe the booklet as follows:
How will we move towards sustainability? By learning through crisis, or by design? In this Briefing, Stephen Sterling points out that:
- progress towards a more sustainable future critically depends on learning, yet most education and learning take no account of sustainability
- the reorientation of education towards sustainable development since the Agenda 21 agreement of 1992 has been very slow
- education is largely behind other fields in developing new thinking and practice in response to the challenge of sustainability.
While 'environmental education' and, more recently, 'education for sustainable development' have become important trends, they are not sufficient to reorient and transform education as a whole. The Briefing critiques the prevailing managerial and mechanistic paradigm in education, and argues that an ecological view of educational theory, practice and policy is necessary to assist the sustainability transition. It then shows how 'sustainable education' - a change of educational culture towards the realization of human potential and the interdependence of social, economic and ecological wellbeing - can lead to transformative learning. The Briefing ends with a discussion of change strategies, emphasizing the need for vision and design at all levels of educational systems, and includes action suggestions for both policy-makers and practitioners.
"I've read no clearer or more concise description of the need for authentic education than that given here . . . The stakes have never been higher." - David Orr, Professor, Environmental Studies Program, Oberlin College, Ohio, USA
Sterling, S. (2001) Sustainable Education: Revisioning Learning and Change (Schumacher Briefing), Greenbooks
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