What knowledge is of most worth? The interface of sustainability sciences, social learning and curriculum

Partnering Institute: 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 of Stellenbosch 

Project leads: Distinguished Professor Lesley Le Grange and Distinguished Professor Mark Swilling

About the project: As a developing country South Africa faces multiple challenges. These challenges are complex, they manifest locally but also resonate with challenges on a global scale. The challenges are the raison d’être of the  SDGs. Unprecedented levels of inequality, coupled with immanent ecological disaster brings the perennial existential questions of 'how should we live together?' with the curriculum question, 'what knowledge is of most worth?'. The latter concerns what knowledge should be included in formal education programmes of schools, universities and TVET colleges. Moreover, given a growing body of knowledge being produced in the Sustainability Sciences (as reflected in this CoP), to what extent is this corpus of knowledge reflected in programmes at all levels and in all sectors of the education system? Linked to this is the question of how Sustainability Science should be constructed, organized and  sequenced in education programmes given the complex, place-based nature of sustainability issues, and the need for skills development that will lead to productive employment in societies transitioning to a just green economy. But, the issues are deeper than those simply related to  curriculum design and outcomes, notwithstanding the importance of these. More importantly, is to ask how we might rethink the idea of curriculum, so that it is not a plan to  mplement but inherently a process of transformation that links places, people, knowledge(s) and skills. In other words, how might we conceive, come to understand and construct place-based curricula, that are not only concerned with curricular reform, but involve “the issue of human responsiveness and adaptability to the local and global dilemmas that now demand our attention, intelligence, and energy” (Gruenewald & Smith, 2008). The research overall, will address the wider philosophical questions of what knowledge is of worth, and how might we live, key questions that shape any deliberations on education in the world today.

The importance of contributing to a sustainable future is captured in Stellenbosch 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网’s Vision 2040. The university has a strong network of researchers from a range of faculties who conduct research in  environmental and sustainability related fields, not least being the world renown Centre of Excellence in Conservation and Invasion Biology (C.I.B) and the Centre for Complexity Systems in Transition (CST). A  number of publications emerging from these research programmes reflect on a perceived mis-alignment or lack of alignment between education (curriculum) and the Sustainability Sciences (e.g. invasion biology sciences - Richardson et al. in press). This problem is also found in water, climate change and green economy education in schools and universities (Lotz-Sisitka et al., 2016; Urquart & Lotz-Sisitka, 2014) indicating this to be a wider issue of uptake and flow of knowledge into the education system. Deeper analysis of this problem is needed. The Faculty of Education in which this proposed CoP research contribution will be situated forms part of the broader 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 of Stellenbosch Sustainability Science network. It has a strong tradition of more than two decades of research in environmental and sustainability  education of both an empirical and theoretical nature, and has well established national and international networks. In the field of Curriculum  Studies the Faculty of Education has networks on all five continents of the world and Distinguished Professor Lesley Le Grange is currently Vice-President of the International Association of Curriculum Studies (IAACS). Distinguished Professor Mark Swilling, who will collaborate on this proposal, is a world leading   Sustainability Scientist, currently working on deep and just transitions towards sustainability (Swilling et al., 2012). It is against the above description of expertise that Stellenbosch  老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 will contribute education and learning science knowledge,  informed by the histories and empirical corpus of studies in the C.I.B and the Centre for Complex Systems in Transition, by focusing in on the meaning(s) of these sciences for curriculum innovation in contemporary  South Africa, where there are strong calls for decolonized, relevant and  responsive curricula that are also future-oriented and cutting edge. This will be done through a meta-review of how a place-based approach to  Sustainability Sciences can generate new thinking around decolonization of education at the education and sustainability   interface. Other Sustainability Science projects in the broader CoP will also benefit from this meta review, as the conceptual and practical review tools developed for this meta-analysis can be more widely applied by CoP partners. The following aims will guide this meta review work (pertaining specifically to how Sustainability Sciences make their way into education systems):

• To identify key knowledge themes that the sustainability sciences have produced and to analyse the underlying epistemological foundations of this knowledge;
  
  
• With this, develop a comparative review with the epistemological foundations of the South African school curriculum, and typical undergraduate university programmes to establish how these relate, also to teachers’ lived experiences of this knowledge, in order to;
  
  
• Develop conceptual framework(s) that can support and guide curriculum development at the interface of Sustainability Science, Social Learning, Sustainable Development and Curriculum Innovation. It is evident from prior research that environmental concerns are often superficially infused into national curriculum frameworks (Le Grange  2010); national curriculum frameworks do not address continuity and progression adequately i.e. how knowledge is sequenced and learning deepened across grades (see Dempster & Hugo 2006; Beets & Le  Grange 2005, 2008); national curriculum frameworks define place in very narrow, technical terms and therefore teachers tend to emphasise this understanding of place in their classroom s (Ontong & Le Grange, 2014,  2015) and, neglect teachers life stories which impact on how sustainability is taught (Ontong & Le Grange 2015).

The research methods that will be used are both philosophical and  empirical in nature. Empirical methods will include literature reviews including a systematic study of what is known about integration of the Sustainability Sciences in curricula (to be done with Prof Lotz-Sisitka, SARChI Chair at RU); content analysis; interviews with CoP members and other sustainability scientists, and conceptual / theoretical development to guide the meta-review. This work will draw on the scientific work being produced in all of the thematic areas of this CoP. Theoretical work will examine different theories of place and sustainability and how these might inform decolonisation theory and praxis, because theoretical exploration on the notion of place is underdeveloped. Greater conceptual understanding (or how it could be imagined differently) will be complemented by insights from empirical, place-based work done by other members of the CoP (e.g. Olifants, Tsitsa, Berg-Breede catchments etc.). In the last decade we have seen a burgeoning of literature on decolonisation theory (also named theories of the south, southern theory, indigenous ethodologies, decolonising methods, and so forth) and debates on decolonisation have currency in South Africa, yet there is almost no research that links this to place based curriculum development or the Sustainability Sciences. The main policy outcomes will be to inform national curriculum development (the CAPS curriculum is currently beginning a phase of revision), practice outcomes will be to provide curriculum development guidance for the Sustainability Sciences, and scientific outcomes will be to provide in-depth theoretical analysis tools for use in advancing the sustainability sciences in education.

Distinguished Professor Lesley Le Grange

Distinguished Professor Le Grange is an internationally respected Curriculum Studies scholar who works on curriculum theory and practice in the sustainability sciences. He will bring curriculum theory and research expertise to the CoP, and via meta-analysis and theoretical work, he will provide support and guidance to other curriculum innovation and learning processes in the CoP. He will also work with partners at the US who are involved in Sustainability Sciences to engage local teachers in exploring their experience of sustainability sciences knowledge. His study will investigate the epistemic foundations of sustainability sciences, and probe the gap between these emerging sciences and the mainstream educational sciences from an epistemological and ontological point of view, probing also the significance of place-based approaches for sustainability science learning. His work will contribute to all three thematic areas.

Distinguished Professor Mark Swilling

Distinguished Professor Mark Swilling is Director of the Complexity of Systems in Transition (CST) Centre at the 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 of Stellenbosch. He will work with Distinguished Professor Le Grange on the US project, which will surface the epistemic foundations of Sustainability Sciences for Just Transitions. He will also contribute more broadly to policy direction impacts for the CoP, given his expertise in Just Transitions and associated economic and public policy. He also links the CoP to the International Sustainability Transitions (IST) network.

Last Modified: Fri, 10 Sep 2021 16:40:25 SAST