Today’s lecture was given by Graham Allen the Environmental Manager of Swansea Metropolitan University he discussed education for sustainable developed and why it is used. According the Graham there are 300 definitions of sustainable development it is said by many that human development and the protection of the natural environment come as one and therefore it is important to understand sustainable development isn’t just environmental concerns and includes all things to do with the world. It is also important to consider the idea of action as a component of education as part of a sustainable development to allow people to understand that for sustainable development to continue the responsibility would be with themselves. This then means that education for sustainable development is there to encourage learners to take in the information being given to them and that this is more important that only learning particular things that may come up during assignments or exams. There was then a global action plan created for the 21st century by the Rio Summit who believed that the role of promoting the sustainable development should be made explicit by Agenda 21. Their plan was to extend the ability of students and allow them to be able to think for themselves, they also wanted to ensure that when learning the learner would discover a way of learning that would develop due to their life experiences and also to encourage them to be able to reflect and debate on issues that would enable them to create their own opinions and ideas. The Welsh Assembly Government (2011) state:
‘To deliver on the Assembly’s commitment to sustainable development all students need to acquire the necessary skills, knowledge base, values and attitudes to be active global citizens in creating a sustainable society.’ P.8
When considering the idea of re-orientating the UK education policy it is important to embrace the idea of sustainable development. The idea of education for sustainable development could be said to be a holistic approach for things such as the curriculum and requires teaching and the government on how they should teach and also on what should be taught.
So as you can see the goals of sustainable develop is to ensure that all people through the world are able to live a normal quality of life without the future lives of others being compromised. In today’s society there are still a number of places that are not within the band of a good quality of life, these places cannot be assisted because of the lack of funding, the also means that the educational system within these areas are effected due to the lack of funding to allow improvements such as the amount of equipment provided and the quality of teachers. There is now a massive divide between the poor and the rich with the government having to find new ways to ensure that this doesn’t persist. Some of the ways that the Welsh Government has done this is by providing things such as breakfast club and free school meals. There are a number of worries that parent from poor backgrounds will not force their children to work efficiently within schools due to the fact that they may be needed to go out to work to provide for their families or because their parents were previously failed by the Welsh Government and now they believe they will do the same to their child.
Reference
Welsh Assembly Government (2009) Education for Sustainable Development and Global Citizenship Retrieved 18th April 2012 from http://www.esd-wales.org.uk/english/ESDreports/pdf/D674_English.pdf
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