A national strategy for education for sustainable development

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is an essential component in a nation’s efforts to achieve sustainability because it empowers citizens – irrespective of age, gender, ethnic group, belief and walk of life – to become active participants in ensuring a good quality of life based on respect and care for the community.

This is achieved by helping citizens to change mind-sets that promote unsustainable behaviours and practices through critical reflection, the exploration of alternative lifestyles and choices, good governance, and better management of resources.

The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE)’s Strategy for Education for Sustainable Development envisages “a region that embraces common values of solidarity, equality and mutual respect between people, countries and generations” and where sustainable development implies “economic vitality, justice, social cohesion, environmental protection and the sustainable management of natural resources,” thus ensuring that the needs of present and future generations are met.

The Mediterranean Strategy on Education for Sustainable Development, developed by the Mediterranean Information Office for Environment, Culture and Sustainable Development (MIO-ECSDE), builds upon the UNECE strategy and frames it within the reality of the Mediterranean region.

Being at the crossroads of three continents, the Mediterranean has always been a theatre for various forms of interactions: religions, politics, conflicts, languages, cultures, and trade. Specific environmental issues together with the varied socio-economic conditions that characterise the Mediterranean had – and are still having – a significant impact on sustainable development in the region.

Our conception of sustainable development must evolve continuously and adapt to respond to the new challenges and dilemmas that we face.

Consequently, ESD needs to adapt accordingly by providing the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values necessary to help the learner explore and respond to changing scenarios. It is to be highlighted that ESD is an essential component in any strategy aimed at achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) identified at the September 2015 UN General Assembly.

ESD is a lifelong process spanning from early childhood to adulthood. Crucial in this continuous process are the formative early years during which attitudes, values and lifestyles are forged.

It is for this reason that our educational programmes for higher education, vocational education, training for educators and continuing professional development (CPD) courses, should include teaching on sustainable development. Moreover, ESD should move beyond formal education settings and provide experiences within the non-formal and the informal sectors. Formal ESD should promote out-of-class experiences that provide experiences in nature and develop school-community links enabling citizens to contextualise their learning to the realities that surround them.

ESD should shift the focus away from solely transmitting information towards facilitating participatory learning enabling citizens to actively participate in decision making, promote democratic processes, work in teams, and develop networks and partnerships.

UNECE remarked that ESD should not be a cosmetic change to our educational system that can be addressed simply by the introduction/addition of subject content to programmes of learning, but it implies developing communities of learning between learners and their educators where knowledge is collaboratively and actively constructed in response to multiand inter-disciplinary examination of real-life situations.

Although over the years certain subject areas introduced various aspects of sustainable development as part of their ongoing process of subject development, we need to adopt ESD themes across all subject areas as well as through the provision of specific subject programmes and courses.

Formal education institutions and other non-formal and informal entities should adopt sustainable development principles in the management, procurement practices and involve the active participation in decision making of the various stakeholders – particularly the citizens. They should also cater for the provision of adult learning schemes, and community based ESD programmes.

Promoting sustainability is a collective responsibility and therefore ESD should also feature in specialised training programmes for professionals and decision makers. Educators who understand what constitutes ESD and are equipped with the necessary expertise to adopt transformative pedagogies are an essential component of effective ESD provision.

Consequently, ESD needs to be an important component of initial and continuing training programmes for educators.

Malta’s commitment towards ESD has matured over the years. It developed progressively into a co-ordinated effort involving various stakeholders.

Two major milestones in the development of national ESD were (i) the setting up of the Centre for Environmental Education and Research (CEER) that stepped up research and resource development in ESD, and (ii) the inclusion of ESD as a cross-curricular theme in the National Curriculum Framework (NCF).

More recently, an independent Board of Governors was appointed with the specific remit of planning and initiating the development of the first National Strategy for Educational Sustainable Development (NSESD).

The NSESD will be a document setting specific targets to be achieved, and describes how success can be measured and evaluated. It will, amongst other themes: (a) identify needs, priorities, activities and target groups; (b) promote ESD initiatives in formal, non-formal and informal contexts; (c) identify community-based resources and skills; (d) provide the training of ESDcompetent educators.

I have to say that, as a Ministry for Education, we have already taken a number of initiatives, such as the Eco-Schools programme, being run by the Foundation for Educational Services, and the setting up of the Centre for Environmental Education and Research, at the University of Malta. But we need to do more and once the NSESD is published, we would see several initiatives, which our educational service providers will take on board and start implementing.

Once the document will be launched, towards the end of this current year, it would mark another step towards achieving a more sustainable development in its widest definition.