Actions and Opportunities
Abstract
This paper provides an overview of North American efforts to address social and sustainable development in undergraduate biology and teacher education. Progress has been uneven as non-governmental organizations (NGOs) rather than national policy are primarily responsible for infusing sustainability education into all levels of learning. Higher education addresses education for sustainable development (ESD) in several patterns: offering academic programs with sustainability emphases, using ESD as a co-curricular theme, greening of campus and curriculum, creating new courses on sustainability itself, and injecting ESD units or modules into individual courses. U.S. teacher education programs lag in the introduction of ESD topics due to decentralized control over education, existence of few official standards for ESD, and optional national accreditation of teacher education programs (they are state accredited). Changes in pedagogy are needed to facilitate integration of ESD.
Keywords
Teacher Education Teacher Education Program Problem Base Learn High Education Opportunity Undergraduate BiologyPreview
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