Sustainability Education in Scotland: The Impact of National and International Initiatives on Teacher Education and Outdoor Education

Abstract

This article explores aspects of teacher education and outdoor education and their relationship with sustainability education (SE) in Scotland. It considers recent national and international developments in the field and in particular the UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) initiative to ‘re-orient teacher education towards sustainable futures’. The implications of such initiatives in schools and teacher education institutes are discussed in the context of formal provision (e.g. geography) and informal opportunities (e.g. citizenship education, outdoor education). The emphasis is on the Scottish experience with the policy and practice of the School of Education of the University of Edinburgh being discussed as an example in relation to this national and international framework.

Keywords:

• Sustainability
• education for sustainable development
• geography
• citizenship
• outdoor education
• teacher training

Notes

¹ The term ‘Education for Sustainable Development’ (ESD) is used in the Scottish Office documentation and so it is retained here. However, the term has been the subject of much debate, and ‘Sustainable Education’ (SE) is used in preference elsewhere in this article.

² School of Education, University of Edinburgh and Institute of Education, Manchester Metropolitan University: Educating for a Sustainable Future. This site is dedicated to providing online supported self-study materials for courses in Education for Sustainability in teacher education. The URL is: http://www.education.ed.ac.uk/esf

³ For further details see the University of Edinburgh Outdoor Education Website: http://www.education.ed.ac.uk/outdoored

⁴ The outcomes of this consultation are intended to inform educational policy in countries throughout the world and are summarized in reports on the project website (http://www.learning2004.se).