Vision of Earth Education for Sustainable Societies

Strategic Framework for the Vision

Successful earth education for sustainable societies:

• Recognizes the urgency for change and builds agency to support individual and collective action at the local to global scales.
• Develops an Earth-literate population and workforce.
• Develops an understanding of earth systems and a capacity for systems thinking
• Incorporates the expertise of many disciplines from the sciences, social sciences, and humanities
• Embraces the values, experiences, and wisdom that come from diverse cultures, recognizing that solutions must be driven by the communities involved.
• Uses data, observations, skills, and processes to address issues relevant to society (e.g., resource limitations, hazards, environmental degradation, declining biodiversity)
• Supports lifelong learning in a learning ecosystem, that includes preK and continues through primary, secondary, higher education, and adult and informal education.
• Makes use of evidence-based teaching practices, is accessible, meaningful, equitable, and implemented in ways that support learning for all students.
• Continually improves as educators draw from and contribute to ongoing educational and scientific research.

Authors

The 2019 Earth Education for Sustainable Societies workshop brought together diverse participants to contribute to a community vision, set priority work areas, and begin to collaboratively work in one or more of those areas.