by Ann Finlayson, SEEd Founder
We have great pleasure in announcing that Professor Stephen Sterling has agreed to become SEEd’s first ever President. We are absolutely delighted, as all of our work is informed by Stephen’s thinking and practice.
As a leading philosopher of Sustainable Education, Stephen’s values and thinking align with SEEd’s. His vision of education – one that will prepare us for a fair and sustainable future – is in his books, articles and policy advice all over the world, and dates back over 40 years!
His works are all listed here and are certainly well worth a read.
Though Stephen himself is not sure, he may have been the first person to talk about sustainable education, or education for sustainability, back in the early 1980’s. His thinking and vision that has developed since then revolves around taking a holistic, ecological world view, systems thinking, anticipative learning and transformative (not adaptive) change.
The overarching question that drives him, and his work is:
“How should – and how can – education and learning be re-thought and re-configured to make a significant and central contribution to achieving a more sustainable and just world?”
Since the first formulation this question, I have given it more thought, and feel it can be re-stated in a deeper way as follows:
What is the nature of the change of consciousness that appears necessary to the achievement of a safe, more ecologically sustainable and liveable society – one that can both survive and thrive?
For more information about Stephen, his career, publications and leading thinking, please do visit his website here.
On a more personal note, my move from Canada to the UK was informed by reading “Education for Sustainability” (John Huckle and Stephen Sterling, eds. 1996). I realised then that this was the type of education and work I was looking for, rather than a future in writing classroom resources on charismatic megafauna!
Upon moving back, I got my first UK-based job at WWF-UK. Imagine my surprise when I opened my desk drawer to find it had been Stephen’s desk before me! Since then, our work lives continue to cross, culminating now in his Presidency with SEEd!
Ann Finlayson
