Developing an ESD Change Project

The Sustainability Starts with Teachers is an action learning progamme centred around a contextually defined Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) Change Project. During this course, you will be developing an ESD Change Project within your institution that is relevant to your context.

The change project is an institutional change initiative, and therefore needs to be collectively developed with others in the institution. We use the term ‘community of practice to indicate the need to work with others on the practice of developing an institutional ESD Change Project. The purpose is to develop innovative, exemplary ESD practices that can be more widely shared in the SADC Region, and internationally within Africa, and the UNESCO and SARUA networks and structures.

Watch this video that introduces you to some of the key aspects of education and its role in sustainable development.

The Change Project will provide answers to the following questions:

  • How can early childhood, primary and secondary school teacher education and learning and TVET instruction be transformed in order to respond to African sustainable development concerns, and to 21st century challenges?

  • How should teacher education and TVET instruction be structured to enable this?

It is important to always keep the qualities of a good change project in mind when working on your Change Project!

The following qualities of a good ESD Change Project can serve as guidance for conceptualising and planning your ESD Change Project. They can also be used for reviewing and evaluating ESD Change Projects. The Change Project should:

  • Respond to and potentially contribute towards relevant national and institutional policies and strategies,

  • be aligned to national and institutional curricula frameworks and potentially contribute to curriculum transformation,

  • have a clear learning transformative learning (ESD) thrust,

  • enhance inter-departmental engagement and communication,

  • have a whole institution approach,

  • focus on a variety of learning domains, and

  • foster life-long learning?

Watch the narrated PowerPoint Presentation on the on the qualities of a good ESD Change Project and then please post a forum message  in which you introduce yourself , reflect on the reasons why you decided to participate in this course, and share the initial ideas you have for an institutional Change Project that can reflect these qualities of a good Change Project.