Drivers and barriers for implementing learning for Sustainable Development

The first workshop in the series was Drivers and Barriers for Implementing Sustainable Development in Higher Education (Göteborg, 2005). Two more workshops are planned, which include one for Non-governmental Organizations (NGOs), with informal and non-formal sectors of the education system, and one entitled The Role of Early Childhood Education in a Sustainable Society. 

All four workshops are intended to go more deeply into the problems identified at the major consultation of 2004 and the outcomes are to serve in the planning and preparation of the next International Consultation foreseen in 2008. The aim of the four workshops is to offer a forum for discussion of issues with respect to the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development 2005-2014. The invitation to the workshop in March was designed to give us, despite the limited number of participants (25), as broad and deep a picture as possible of how Learning for Sustainable Development is treated and the problems that are identified throughout the formal school system leading to, and including upper secondary level. We invited teachers, teacher educators and researchers engaged in Education for Sustainable Development. We also looked for variation in both a north-south and an east-west dimension – in other words, a multidimensional representation from a cultural, religious, economic and political point of view. 

We are grateful for the rich contribution we got from all participants during the workshop and through the papers presented here. We hope that this publication will contribute to the ongoing discussion on matters relating to Learning for Sustainable Development among teachers, teacher educators and researchers and thus promote the development of teaching for a sustainable future. 

We would like to thank Søren Breiting, Mark Rickinson and Inger Bjorneloo for chairing the workshop sessions, and Gunnar Jonsson, Eva Nyberg and Per Sund for the note taking during the discussions. We also appreciate the work of Malin Malmberg, Christer Larsson, Eva Nyberg and Inger Björneloo for the planning and implementation of the workshop. We are very grateful to Saba Bokhari at UNESCO, Paris for working closely with our editorial group in the preparation of this joint publication.

The workshop of March 2006 has been organized and financed by the City of Göteborg’s School Development Unit and the Göteborg University’s Department of Education.