Tomorrow Today

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What is learning for

sustainable development?

Professor Stephen Sterling, Head of Education for Sustainable Development, University of Plymouth, UK

and Senior Advisor to the Higher Education Academy, Education for Sustainable Development Project

he key to a more sustainable future is learning. A self-

evident statement perhaps, but it hides an important

truth: that some learning – indeed, much learning that

dominates currently in educational systems – will not take us

towards a more sustainable future, but rather the opposite. So

‘learning for sustainable development’ is a radical step and

movement that seeks to help assure a more livable, secure and

harmonious society than that in prospect.

A first step towards understanding the nature and implications of

learning for sustainable development is to recognize that the world

is on an unsustainable course, as has been evidenced by a stream of

international reports over some years.

As the Tellus Institute states:

“We stand at a historical crossroads, heading into an uncertain and

perilous future.”

The concept of sustainable development, however it is perceived

(it has been discussed and argued over in detail since coming to

prominence with the Brundtland Report of 1987) can nevertheless

be seen as an attempt to articulate those goals, principles, values and

processes which can help change our collective direction towards a

more hopeful and secure future. Such a trajectory takes into account

the present and future social, economic and ecological well-being

of people and communities, in the context of the Earth’s ecologi-

cal health and resilience. It is driven by rising concern in public

life and wider society as people in all sectors become increasingly

aware of the negative impact and threat of sustainability issues such

as climate change, economic vulnerability, social justice, resource

depletion and species loss – as well as of positive opportunities

to develop more sustainable lifestyles and economic activities. In

essence, sustainability is about trying to ensure a society, economy

and ecology that are viable now and in the long term. As such it has

implications for most aspects of human activity, from local to global

scales – production and consumption, energy, transport, food and

agriculture, construction and housing, trade and equity, employ-

ment, social relations and so on.

Preparing for change

Evidence suggests that we are on the cusp of very different patterns

of social and economic organization, driven by and in response to

the end of cheap energy and the effects of climate change, necessarily

towards more localized, low-carbon, low-waste, resource-efficient

economies.

This presents a very real and urgent challenge for educational

systems and learning, which begs deep questions about their ‘response-

ability’, that is, the ability of the educational community as a whole to

respond adequately to the emerging conditions of both

threat and opportunity that face our communities, our

graduates and our children. To clarify this challenge, we

need to make a distinction between two arenas of learn-

ing: institutional learning and designed learning.

Designed

learning

is the concern of all educational programmes: it

is planned, resourced and provided for different groups

such as school pupils, tertiary-level students and adults in

community education.

Institutional learning

refers to the

social and organizational learning that the policy makers

and providers may themselves undergo or experience: for

example, government educational departments, schools,

universities and educational agencies.

The critical point is that sufficient change towards

sustainability in designed learning, including aims,

curricula, methods, assessment, reward structures etc.,

is directly dependent on sufficient institutional learn-

ing – which can, in turn, facilitate re-design. Without

this, layering or inserting sustainability into educa-

tional policy and practices that otherwise remain largely

unchanged may have value, but is insufficient. In other

words, sustainability requires learning within educa-

tional systems, not just learning through educational

systems. As I have argued elsewhere, sustainability

“implies a change of fundamental epistemology in our

culture and hence also in our educational thinking and

practice. Seen in this light, sustainability is not just

another issue to be added to an overcrowded curriculum,

but a gateway to a different view of curriculum, of peda-

gogy, of organizational change, of policy and particularly

of ethos.”

More widely, as Williams suggests: “This

learning…needs to be a core part of learning across

society, necessitating a metamorphosis of many of our

current education and learning constructs.”

The significance of this lies in the need to re-design

educational programmes so that learners can experi-

ence the kind of education that is appropriate to our

times. In essence, this is education that prepares people

to cope with, manage and shape social, economic and

ecological conditions characterized by change, uncer-

tainty, risk and complexity.

Common themes and new perspectives

What this means in practice has been addressed by a

growing literature around sustainability education