Teacher and youth priorities for education for environmental sustainability: a co-created manifesto

TY - JOUR

T1 - Teacher and youth priorities for education for environmental sustainability

T2 - a co-created manifesto

AU - Dunlop, Lynda

AU - Rushton, Elizabeth

AU - Atkinson, Lucy

AU - Ayre, Jacquie

AU - Bullivant, Andrea

AU - Essex, Jane

AU - Price, Laura

AU - Smith , Amanda

AU - Summer, Maisy

AU - Stubbs, Joshua

AU - Turkenburg, Maria Gertrudis Wilhelmina

AU - Wood, Lucy

N1 - © 2022 The Authors.

PY - 2022/4/6

Y1 - 2022/4/6

N2 - What would it mean to put environmental sustainability at the heart of education? This article describes a process of inclusive, participatory manifesto-making to identify young people’s (aged 16-18 years) and teachers’ priorities for education for environmental sustainability across the UK. Drawing on analysis of qualitative data from over 200 teachers and young people who participated in futures and visualisation workshops, we identify key educational priorities at the levels of classroom, school, community and policy, based on consensus between teacher and youth perspectives. Whilst consensus-seeking comes with a risk of favouring ‘soft’ actions which reinforce unsustainable practices and systems, the process of identifying more desirable futures and immediate barriers, which must be negotiated to reach them, has the potential to create spaces for more critical pedagogies and practices. There is a need for policy makers and school leaders to recognise the interests of teachers and young people to enable greater participation in decision making at different scales, and to ensure that those with the greatest capacity bear their burden of responsibility for education for environmental sustainability.

AB - What would it mean to put environmental sustainability at the heart of education? This article describes a process of inclusive, participatory manifesto-making to identify young people’s (aged 16-18 years) and teachers’ priorities for education for environmental sustainability across the UK. Drawing on analysis of qualitative data from over 200 teachers and young people who participated in futures and visualisation workshops, we identify key educational priorities at the levels of classroom, school, community and policy, based on consensus between teacher and youth perspectives. Whilst consensus-seeking comes with a risk of favouring ‘soft’ actions which reinforce unsustainable practices and systems, the process of identifying more desirable futures and immediate barriers, which must be negotiated to reach them, has the potential to create spaces for more critical pedagogies and practices. There is a need for policy makers and school leaders to recognise the interests of teachers and young people to enable greater participation in decision making at different scales, and to ensure that those with the greatest capacity bear their burden of responsibility for education for environmental sustainability.

KW - environment

KW - sustainability

KW - teachers

KW - youth

UR - https://bera-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/berj.3803

U2 - 10.1002/berj.3803

DO - 10.1002/berj.3803

M3 - Article

SN - 0141-1926

JO - British Educational Research Journal

JF - British Educational Research Journal

ER -