Whole school approaches to education for sustainable development: a model that links to school improvement

Figures & data

Figure 1. Interpretation of the Scherp model used to visualise the school organisation in this study.

Table 1. The survey items covering the dimensions and their coherence in the Scherp model of school organisation.

Code	Items covering specific dimensions of the Scherp model
	Introduction to the Holism items: If you share a holistic vision, how do the following statements correspond to your views?
H1	My school’s holistic vision influences my daily work as a teacher.
H2	My school’s holistic vision is used as a basis for evaluating our work.
H3	My school’s holistic vision is often used as a starting point when we plan our work
	Introduction to the Routines and structures items: What characterises the routines and structures in your school?
RS1^1	Our school’s routines and structures are designed to facilitate implementation of our holistic vision.
RS2^2	In our school, the routines and structures are adjusted in accordance with our increasing knowledge of how we can best contribute to student progress.
RS3	In our school, the school leader creates organisational conditions that promote staff’s shared learning on the basis of urgent issues.
	Introduction to the Professional knowledge creation items: What characterises systematic learning and teaching in your school?
PKC1	In our school, we concentrate development efforts on areas that we feel are most urgent.
PKC2	In our school, we work in groups for prolonged periods (a term or school year) to learn more about an issue together with others who share interest in the issue.
PKC3	In our school, we conduct our own investigations by interviewing colleagues and students to collect information about the learning process.
PKC4	In our school, our conversations are coloured by challenges of each other’s ideas on how we can contribute to student development.
PKC5	In our school, there are educational development leaders who conduct discussions and promote systematic knowledge formation.
PKC6	In our school, professional development is based on the problems that arise daily in educational activities.
	Items related to the coherence (C) of the dimensions of the Scherp model
	Introduction to the H-PP-item: If you share a holistic vision, how do the following statements correspond to your views?
H-PP	My school’s holistic vision and our pedagogical practice are consistent.
	Introduction to the RS-PKC-items: What characterises the educational activities in your school?
RS-PKC1^2	In our school, the routines and structures are adjusted along with our increasing knowledge of how we best can contribute to student progress
RS-PKC 2	In our school, conclusions and knowledge about how best to contribute to student development are documented.
	Introduction to the H-RS-items: How is the holistic vision related to the routines and structures?
H-RS^1	Our routines and structures facilitate implementation of our holistic pedagogy idea.
	Introduction to the H-PKC-items: How is the holistic vision related to professional knowledge creation?
H-PKC	In our school, we work systematically to learn how to implement our school’s holistic pedagogy idea in our daily work

^1,2Two of the items used to gauge the coherence between dimensions are also part of the variables constructed to measure the overall quality of the school organisation in the Scherp model. These items provide both a measure of how the vision of a school becomes realised (underlying logic) and the dimension’s relative contribution (coherence) to the school’s holistic vision.

Figure 2. Visualisation of teachers’ holistic perception of the structure of their school organisation in terms of Scherp’s model. Comparison between reference schools and ESD-active schools. The top circle represents the Holism dimension, the circle to the left represents the Routines and structures dimension and the circle to the right the Professional knowledge creation dimension.

Figure 3. Visualisation of teachers’ holistic perception of the structure of their school organisation in terms of Scherp’s model. ESD-active schools divided into either award or interdisciplinary implementation strategies or a combination of both. The top circle represents the holistic vision, the circle to the left represents the Routines and structures dimension and the circle to the right the Professional knowledge creation dimension.

Figure 4. Visualisation of teachers’ holistic perception of the structure of their school organisation in terms of Scherp’s model. ESD-active schools divided either into internal or external general quality approaches or a combination of both. The top circle represents the Holistic dimension, the circle to the left represents the Routines and structures dimension and the circle to the right the Professional knowledge creation dimension.

Figure 5. Visualisation of teachers’ holistic perception of the structure of their school organisation in terms of Scherp’s model. Comparing five school improvement processes: reference schools, A, internal general quality approaches and award implementation strategies; B external general quality approaches and interdisciplinary implementation strategies; C, internal general quality approaches and interdisciplinary implementation strategies; D internal and external general quality approaches in addition toa combined award and interdisciplinary strategy. The top circle represents the holistic vision, the circle to the left represents the Routines and structures dimension and the circle to the right the Professional knowledge creation dimension.

Table 2. Permutations of ESD implementation strategies and quality approaches, numbers of schools in our sample adopting them, and numbers of participating teachers (n) from the schools.

	Award-based ESD implementation strategy	Interdisciplinary ESD strategy
Internal quality approach	Permutation A	Permutation C
	3 schools n=20	2 schools n=8
External quality approach	*	Permutation B
		2 schools n=12
Combined internal and external quality approach	**	Permutation D
		1 school n=13

^* The schools representing this category declined participation in the study.

^** No schools representing this category were found in the sample.

Table 3. Sets of schools with varying improvement processes were compared, in four analyses, based on teachers’ perceptions of their organisations in terms of the Scherp’s model.

Compared groups of schools in the four analyses	Numbers of schools and teachers (n) in the compared groups	Dimension of Holism (H)	Dimension of Professional knowledge creation (PKC)	Dimension of Routines and structures (RS)	Overall holistic coherence in the school organisation (C)	Coherence of Holistm and Routines and structures dimensions (H-RS)	Coherence of Holism and Professional knowledge creation dimensions (H-PKC	Coherence of Routines and structures and Professional knowledge creation dimensions (RS-PKC)
Analysis 1: Comparison of reference schools and ESD-active schools.
All included ESD schools	8 schools (n = 53)	3.52	2.57	3.00	2.82	3.11	3.14	2.57
Reference schools	12 schools (n = 205)	3.20	2.41	2.46	2.28	2.87	2.89	2.24
Analysis 2: Comparison of schools with award-based, interdisciplinary and combined ESD implementation strategies
Award schools	3 schools (n = 20)	3.12	2.20	2.89	2.44	3.00	2.80	2.35
Interdisciplinary schools	3 schools (n = 16)	3.39	2.75	2.61	2.68	2.43	3.07	2.50
Combined award and interdisciplinary schools	2 schools (n =  17)	3.75	2.83	3.49	3.33	3.71	3.29	2.87
Analysis 3: Comparison of schools with internal, external and combined general quality approaches.
Internal quality approach	5 schools (n = 28)	3.38	2.38	2.90	2.61	3.15	3.15	2.38
External quality approach	2 schools (n = 12)	3.30	2.66	2.60	2.63	2.30	3.00	2.50
Combined internal and external quality approach	1 school (n = 13)	3.83	2.92	3.59	3.40	3.69	3.23	3.04
Analysis 4: Comparison of schools with different improvement processes (Permutations A-D).
Internal general quality approach and award-based ESD implementation strategy	Permutation A	3.12	2.20	2.90	2.44	3.00	2.80	2.35
	3 schools (n = 20)
External general quality approach and interdisciplinary ESD implementation strategy	Permutation B	3.30	2.66	2.60	2.63	2.30	3.00	2.50
	2 schools (n = 12)
Internal general quality approach and interdisciplinary ESD implementation strategy	Permutation C	3.55	2.79	2.92	2.96	3.25	3.38	2.44
	2 schools (n = 8)
Internal and external general quality approach and award and interdisciplinary ESD implementation strategy	Permutation D	3.83	2.92	3.59	3.40	3.69	3.23	3.04
	1 school (n = 13)

Notes: The presented values are mean Likert scores obtained from teachers’ responses to the items in the questionnaire.