Topic 1 - Introduction to Sustainable Development (Part 5)

Main ideas & lessons (Session recap + new focus)

Recap of earlier content (systems thinking + SD foundations)

The session revisits sustainability through a systems thinking perspective, using examples such as:

• Heat waves
• Sea level rise (e.g., Jakarta)
• Internal displacement
• Climate migration

Core foundations previously covered include:

• Definition of sustainable development
• Alternative worldviews, including:
  • “enough for all, forever”
  • “well-being for all, forever”
• Implementation frameworks:
  • Agenda 21 (1992)
  • Millennium Development Goals (2000)
  • Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (from 2015 onward)
• Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) as an education-sector enabler:
  • More than learning—it empowers learners to make informed decisions and take responsible actions
  • A key enabler for achieving all SDGs
  • Crosscutting across many SDG themes (e.g., workplace, clean energy, clean water, sustainable consumption, sustainable communities)

New topic: Global Citizenship Education (GCED)

The session introduces global citizenship as a complementary approach to ESD, with a short prompt to learners (30 seconds in the video):

“What do you think when you hear the term global citizenship?” (Encouraged to take notes/draw a sketch.)

UNESCO’s explanation of Global Citizenship Education (GCED)

UNESCO frames GCED through the idea of global interdependence, meaning:

• People/places/economies are increasingly interconnected
• Global challenges affect everyone
• Solutions often require thinking and acting beyond national borders

GCED helps learners to:

• Live together in peace
• Develop respect for all
• Build belonging to common humanity, grounded in human rights
• Think critically and understand local–global interconnections
• Build motivation to engage and take active roles to address global challenges
• Contribute to a more just, peaceful, tolerant, sustainable world

Delivery contexts for GCED include:

• In schools (across subjects) and outside school
• Through community associations, authorities, media, and family
• Involving everyone

Effectiveness conditions:

• Teachers should use participatory approaches
• Teachers need appropriate teaching materials
• GCED is most likely to succeed when all girls and boys feel respected and are encouraged to participate

A key message emphasizes that learners can be:

• Global citizens (not limited to a formal club or elite group)

How GCED and ESD differ and complement each other

• Complementary “two lenses” on sustainable development
  • Both aim at sustainability through learning, including cognitive/experiential and socio-emotional development (“head, hands, heart”).
• ESD (leaning natural-science / environmental uncertainty)
  • Emphasizes knowledge and skills to deal with:
    • uncertainty
    • future-oriented phenomena
  • Includes empowerment to act responsibly on sustainability.
• GCED (leaning social-science / relationships & interdependence)
  • Emphasizes interconnections and interdependencies among challenges
  • Not “membership in a frequent flyer/elite club”
  • Not replacing citizenship:
    • Being a citizen of the world with connections to others as part of shared humanity
    • Responsibility to collaborate and act to create a better world
  • Links global ↔ regional ↔ national ↔ local levels, including cultural/social/economic/political interdependencies

Links to SDG 4.7 and education as a crosscutting enabler

• Both ESD and GCED are included in SDG 4.7 (quality education).
• Education applies beyond formal schooling:
  • Early childhood, schools, and universities are not the only venues
  • Education takes place everywhere in the community
• A future challenge is disinformation and misinformation (World Economic Forum framing), making public awareness and understanding essential.
• The session highlights that education should focus on more than just outcomes—consider:
  • status of outcomes (whether learning objectives were achieved)
  • who learners are and what competencies/skills they develop to make a difference

Competencies for sustainability (method: reflection + critical self-check)

The instructor frames sustainability competencies as part of a global four-year reporting cycle, beginning “next year,” with national reporting every four years.

Instructional / methodological framing

Learners are encouraged to critically assess:

• Which competencies you already have
• Which ones you are developing now (after learning about sustainability competencies)
• What learning objectives you want to carry forward personally

The session encourages learners to consider competencies for:

• professional and personal development

Examples of sustainability competencies mentioned

• Respect for diversity
• Decision-making skills
• Ability to act collaboratively
• Media and information literacy
• Citizenship skills
• Anticipatory skills (dealing with uncertain future scenarios)

Systems thinking as a sustainability competence (detailed method)

The instructor emphasizes that systems thinking was already introduced earlier in the course and is central to understanding interconnected SDGs and sustainability problems.

What systems thinking helps you ask/understand

• Connect STGs horizontally and globally
• Use localization:
  • How global goals make sense in the region, country, community, and your life
• Core principle:
  • “Doing something here affects somewhere else.”

Problem analysis questions include:

• What/who causes the issue?
• Who is affected?
• Which institutions and actors are involved?
• What values shape responses (or lack of response)?
• What solutions are possible?
• What trade-offs could occur in other issues?
• What unintended effects may happen?
• Who are the “winners” or “losers”?
• Who benefits from the existing problem vs. from solving it?

Iceberg-model adaptation (understanding deeper drivers)

The session adapts an “iceberg” logic:

• Surface events are visible, but responses are shaped by:
  • underlying patterns of behavior
  • systems/structures
  • mental models

Practical self-guided exercise (example-based)

• When your community faces migration:
  • What behavior patterns shape it?
  • What system structures exist (including governance and institutions)?
  • How is the community helping?
  • What underlying mental models influence responses?
• When livelihoods are taken away due to urbanization reducing farmland:
  • How are current responses shaped by underlying drivers?

Purpose of the exercise

• Build personal systems thinking regularly
• Improve analysis of collective and institutional responses

Session conclusion & learner prompt

The session concludes by tying together:

• Systems thinking
• GCED and ESD as complementary lenses

It reiterates that education is a key enabler because all SDGs require:

• education, training, and public awareness

Final learner prompt (last 30 seconds):

• Consider your main takeaway for the day
• Encouraged to take notes/draw a sketch

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Speakers / sources featured

• Katherine Cole (instructor; York University, Toronto, Canada)
• UNESCO (source providing the explanation of Global Citizenship Education)
• Asia-Pacific Institute for Education and International Understanding (mentioned as collaborating with UNESCO in the video content)