Much of what’s being written about education for sustainable development (including the government’s strategy) is about climate change. Vital though that is, sustainable development goes beyond the environmental, to include economic and social: planet, prosperity and people.
What is sustainable development?
Sustainable development is about ‘[meeting] the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’. We need to balance economic growth with environmental and social realities.
What’s wrong with growth?
Economic development has focused on mass-production and consumption; assuming that growth can continue indefinitely. Success is defined by your place on that pathway, and how you compare to others. But it turns out that the benefits of this growth are distributed unevenly, and when we try to ‘fix’ our way out of problems with technology, we create new problems.
Education is about growth. Just as children learn and develop, the education system can get better. But we seem to be using an old economic model of success, measuring output by test scores, exam passes, and ‘outstanding’ schools, and assuming that these can grow indefinitely. League tables and exam grades position you along the pathway and in competition with others. And we find that the benefits are distributed unevenly, and ‘fixes’ create more inequality, increase workload or deepen deprofessionalisation.
Finding a balance
Environmental sustainability means living within our limits: natural and human resources are limited, even renewables take time to renew. Ecosystems are complex and interrelated, and diversity is vital for a balanced system.
To build social sustainability we need to focus on relationships, communities, equity and inclusion. We need to develop agency, democracy and participation. We have to acknowledge that what we do has an impact on people and planet.
There is a tension in education policy too. Resources are limited: teacher and pupil time is finite; health and wellbeing need time to renew. Education is a complex system, changes in one area will have impacts on others, an increase in accountability can lead to greater pupil exclusions; more curriculum content can lead to pupils being demotivated and learning less. And we’re in constant danger of focussing on outcomes at the expense of relationships, agency and community.
Is education sustainable?
Policy based on an old model of educational growth is unsustainable. We’re decreasing curriculum diversity, with literacy, numeracy and test preparation in primary schools cutting into time for other subjects, and with fewer pupils studying non-EBacc subjects at secondary level (art, music, drama, PE, RE) year-on-year. We’re narrowing the understanding of pedagogy, focusing on control and transmission at the expense of creation and play, even in the EYFS. Resources are being depleted: numbers of teacher trainees are dropping and teacher leaving rates are increasing. We’re not giving time for renewal: teacher workload is increasing, teachers’ working hours are long compared to similar professions, and their real-terms pay is lower than in 2010/11. One in eight children are unhappy with their school lives, feeling increased and unhealthy pressure.
Sustainability is both the destination and the journey
A sustainable education strategy would acknowledge the impact of actions, and policies, on people. It would look at the causes of teacher workload, instead of centralising professional activities like curriculum development and then adding new targets and accountabilities. It would develop a long term process to review curriculum and qualifications, rather than squeezing in a new GCSE on climate change. It would look at how time is used in schools, the opportunities pupils have to engage in depth for long periods in their learning, instead of making blanket proposals on increasing the school week. And it would consider the impact of all policies on the school as a learning community and pupils as active participants in their learning.
Of course schools need to be environmentally sustainable. They need to teach about sustainability – environmental, economic and social. But they also need to be sustainable places to work and learn. For that, we need education policy with sustainability at the centre.
References
https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/5987our-common-future.pdf
https://neu-era.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/downloadable/BJsJE4HobiNYRd7QUSNbyiraxtbFSCWu6eahtU7Q.pdf
Teacher Labour Market in England – Annual Report 2022
The Good Childhood Report | The Children’s Society
Education for sustainable development lens: a policy and practice review tool p16