This section Sustainable Education will provide you the definition of basic concepts (i.e. sustainable education, sustainability education) and will support you understand correctly these concepts, identify relevant curricular areas and use appropriately the pedagogical approaches, that are specific to the Education for Sustainable Development.
Conceptual delimitations
- Sustainable education and sustainability education (or Education for Sustainable Development – ESD) are closely related terms and often used interchangeably in the general discourse, but academic and specialized contexts recognize a distinction between them.
- Definition of sustainable education refers to the sustainability of the educational system, rather than the teaching about sustainability.
- The specialized literature abounds with different definitions of these terms.
- In the following, several such definitions are presented, along with characteristics of the concepts, to provide a more comprehensive basis for understanding the concepts themselves.
Sustainable Education
- Is a system of learning that aims at addressing the social, economic, and physical environment, whose intended learning outcomes are to equip the learner with the knowledge skills, attitudes, and values required to support a sustainable future (Shivam, 2025).
- Is a change of educational culture, one which develops and embodies the theory and practice of sustainability in a way which is critically aware (Jeronen, 2022).
- Integrates the principles of sustainability into the curriculum and pedagogy, teaching not only about the environmental but also economic & social dimensions of sustainability, and how they interconnect (Teaching with Europeana, 2024).
- Refers to knowledge delivery that ensures a balanced national development which encompasses both economic and social development as well as a human needs perspective (Alam, 2023).
- Means making adjustments in the existing educational systems (education improvement & restructuring) and changing the educational paradigm (redesign of education system and institutions on participative basis) (Sterling, 2001).
- Implies whole paradigm change, one which asserts both humanistic and ecological values. […] People will require flexibility, resilience, creativity, participative skills, competence, material restraint and a sense of responsibility and transpersonal ethics to handle transition and provide mutual support. Indeed, an education oriented towards nurturing these qualities would help determine a positive and hopeful breakthrough future (Sterling, 1996).
- Refers to teaching and learning practices that focus on creating environmentally responsible, socially just, and economically viable communities. (Foster International School, n.d.).
- Incorporates sustainability principles to foster awareness about various issues affecting the world (e.g. like global warming, exhaustible resources, social inequality, and others) (21K School, 2025).
- Is democratic education. It seeks to place ownership and determination with educators, learners and communities. People have to feel ownership of their learning – it has to be meaningful, engaging and participative, rather than functional, passive and prescriptive. (Sterling, 2001)
Sustainability Education (or Education for Sustainable Development – ESD)
- Is education approach that aims to develop students, schools, and communities with the values and the motivation to take action for sustainability, in their personal lives, within their community and at a global scale, now and in the future. (Elegbede et. al., 2023)
- Is an approach to teaching and learning based on the ideals and principles that underlie sustainability – human rights, poverty reduction, sustainable livelihoods, peace, environmental protection, democracy, health, biological and landscape diversity, climate change, gender equality, and protection of indigenous cultures.(Canadian Commission for UNESCO, 2025)
- Is the education enabling every human being to acquire the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values necessary to shape a sustainable future. (University of Plymouth, n.d.)
- Empowers people with the knowledge, skills, values, attitudes and behaviors to live in a way that is good for the environment, economy, and society. It encourages people to make smart, responsible choices that help create a better future for everyone. (UNESCO, 2025)
- Encourages a shift from viewing education as a delivery mechanism to a lifelong, holistic and inclusive process. (Australian Government, 2009)
Sustainable Education vs. Sustainability Education
- Ecologically sustainable development depends on sustainable education and learning – which in turn manifests and sustains sustainable development: they are neither separate nor the same. It is an extension of the mutuality nicely summed up in the phrase, “You cannot learn without changing, or change without learning” (Kosko, 1994).
- Fundamentally, we need a changed educational paradigm, one that addresses and indicates positive directions beyond these crises, one that “takes us into the depth of things”. This is what I term ‘sustainable education’, a change of educational culture which both develops and embodies the theory and practice of sustainability in way which is critically aware. This would be a transformative paradigm that values, sustains and realises human potential in relation to the need to attain and sustain social, economic and ecological wellbeing, recognising that they are deeply interdependent. (Sterling, 2001)
Read the additional resources on the topic, given in the bibliography.
Task 1.1 for self-directed learning
- Reflect on what you’ve learned so far about Sustainable Education and Sustainability Education and
- Then, navigate the Internet to:
(1) discover curricular themes/areas that are relevant for Sustainable/Sustainability Education;
(2) identify specific pedagogical approaches in the Education for Sustainable Development (ESD);
- Finally:
Create a list with curricular themes/areas related to social, environmental, economic sustainability (e.g. waste, energy, consumerism, etc.) and pedagogical approaches (e.g., systemic thinking and analysis; thinking creatively for future scenarios) which you, as Sustainability Expert/Trainer could use to teach professionals under your responsibilities.
- Check on your own how prepared you are to use these efficiently!
