Live blogging from Lund: EU as Global Actor

Conference website: http://www.lucsus.lu.se/lundcalling/index.aspx

"Meeting global challenges through creativity and innovation in local education”
...and...
"Education for Sustainable Development merging with European policy and strategy"

10.40
Maria Åsenius - State Secretary to Minister for EU Affairs speaking about key competencies.

Strategy for ESD adopted 3 years ago another strategy for EU SDS: European Union Strategy for Sustainable Development. Indicators are important for measurement: but both technically difficult and politically sensitive.

"Beyond GDP" has been launched. Wellbeing is more than what can be measured in economic terms... so high economic growth is better than low or no economic growth, but it does not necessarily mean than people are better off.

Also interesting is some of the discussion that is happening on the sms-screen in the background -- lots of chatter near the end about youth involvement. Some messages were suggesting that youth were too immature or inexperienced to be involved in making long-term strategic decisions. Others suggested that youth were indeed a necessary part of the dialog and need to be more involved -- one message making the point that the people who have caused many of the problems we have today should not be the ones to solve the problems & that older people in the conversations today will be gone before long, while the youth live on...

Makes me wonder about the ability to bring together the innovation of youth with the experience of age -- and co-create something that is really good.

Lots of Einstein quotes! "Problems can not be solved..." "Everything that counts..." and another that I've already forgotten. :( Guess Per Eriksson was right earlier: people don't remember anything from conference openings!

10.55
Anders Wijkman
Originally saying about harmony between three-legged stool: economy, environment, and people. Different types of capital are more or less substitable.

... but now we shouldn't talk about a chair with 3 legs. We need a platform first! If the natural capital is lost, no amount of financial capital can buy it. If ozone is gone, no amount of money can get it back. If social capital is lost, there are risks that are very, very hard to get back!

Economy is important... but that does not mean that you have to be a supporter of the conventional growth concept.

Conventional growth concept - GDP - is serious barrier to change: sends wrong signals + provide wrong objectives.

Current policy framework is flawed:
- does not take nature into account
- makes no distinction between different types of growth
- income distribution, equity, social inclusion NOT at center stage

Thomas Friedman in New York times, March 2009: "Mother Nature doesn't do bailouts"

So we need to rethink conventional growth...
- our eco footprint increases all the time
- 2/3 of major ecosystems are overused (Tony: doesn't the term "use" reflect part of the mental problem we have!?!?!)

"Planetary Boundaries" article in Science last week (Tony: I think it was 24 Sept. Interesting article - that makes the point about basic principles for sustainability being all the more important. KHR: Can we write a followup article??)

Key proposals for economic reform:
- "Beyond GDP" - proposal to find alternative measure by 2010
- Define boundary conditions
- TEEB
- PPP -- let polluter pay

Lisbon strategy and SDS must be merged. They do not work on parallel tracks! Must use EU budget more strategically. CAP must be reformed to support SDS.


How does it affect education:
- Need an integrated approach
- Some of resistance to sustainability is due to vested interest.
- But also much is due to lack of real understanding - vertical org of society, including education, is a serious problem
- Neo-classical economics is a particular problem. (Stockholm, London school of economics don't teach anything about ecosystems!!)

Suggestions
- go from "verticalists" to working in the "interest of the whole"; need both specialists and cross-disciplinists
- Review curricula at all levels to promote a world view that fully appreciates natural systems
- Help competence among teachers
- Focus on potential of ICT for Sustainability
- EU Ref Fmwk ok Key Competencies for Life-Long Learning -- add a 9th, focusing on sustainability!
- Encourage the EU to organize regular conferences on ESD for practitioners!


Young Masters Program at Lund University. Cool! Reminds me of our MSLS program at BTH: www.bth.se/msls


Tony: Energetic and thoughtful: Wijkman delivers!!


Voting now via mobile phone: what is your main professional perspective on ESD?
I'm in the formal education option... the SMS interaction is an interesting concept, but so far my feeling is that it needs a bit more work to be really effective.

Looks like people are participating: over 100 votes (supposed to be 350 participants)
options:
c. formal education
d. non-formal education
e. informal education
f. policy and governance

Seems like there are some technological challenges in tabulating the voting -- total now is 20-10-6-20% -- not adding up to 100%. :(

I'm going to lose battery soon. Will resume when I find a power source... or figure out how to power my laptop from the energy in the crowd! :)

11.20
Ingrid Pramling Samuelsson, Dept of Ed, U. of Gothenburg
The Gothernburg Recommendations, Nov 2008

Recs are general, and must interpretted to the level & context you work within.

Access for all to a lifelong learning
- Education for all (EFA)
- ECE the starting point
- Continuous access (informal and non-formal)
- Quality and form that incluence ppl to re-orient society towards sust. (not ANY education, but a specific ed)

Gender
- Work against traditional gender roles
- Women's contribution

Learning for Change
- Multiple perspctives
- Real life questions - solving complex questions
- Interdisciplinary
- Empowerment for social change

Networks, arenas, and partnerships
- Promote relationships between different edu levels, sites, perspectives
- International, intercultural cooperation
- Global Alliances and NGOs: sooooo many NGOs in the world!

Professional dev to strengthen ESD across all sectors
- from teacher ed to journalism
- tight link with democracy and human rights

ESD in curriculum
- ESD needs to be embedded in curriculum, steering docs, etc
- Multiy-, inter-, and trans-disciplinary curriculum -- content & form

SD in practice
- Edu settings should practice values and principles of SD
- Develop behavioral norms for change!
- You have to LIVE and FOCUS attention. Helps to have good examples

Research
- must embrace multiple sites and foci of ESD
- Community participatory research and indigenous and local knowledge

Early childhood education is important! More and more research showing the benefits of early childhood ed. When talking about SD - have to have a broad view... nutrition, etc. Need people in parliament that will fight for young children!

... battery dies. Resume blogging over lunch...



Amazing how much of what is being talked about here at the conference is what we already do at BTH: broad perspective, integrated sustainability into all aspects of work rather than sustainability being a "stand-alone" or "add-on", etc. Nice reassurance that we are on the right track!!

I'll try to recap points from Charlie Hopkins and Magnus Persson. Charlie was one of 10 people who helped to write the original Rio declaration in 1992... so he's been around for a while and now has some quite interesting perspectives on ESD. One of his best points: "After 'country', the word 'education' is the most used word in Agenda 21. But no one tells the educators."

"It's not just ACCESS to education, it's also about the QUALITY of the education that you have access to."

During one of the technical challenges (I think it happened that Magnus pulled the power cord out of the computer and it shut off), Charlie kept the conversation going by sharing the concept of Ecological Footprint, reminding us that it was created by Rees and Wackernagel at a university. He then went on to share the idea of the "Ecological Handprint" -- suggested by an Indian girl in the 4th grade -- referring to that which each of us can do to contribute to SD. Nice inspiration!

Some nice discussion about whether SD / ESD should be its own competency, or whether it should be embedded within or implicit within the other competencies. Wijkman made a pretty strong case that it should be explicitly listed as its own competency for fear of being lost if it is not so.

Not sure that I'm doing justice to the main points of Charlie and Magnus -- but I'm struggling to follow some of the conversations! So much history of the conversation around ESD from the past years that I have not followed. Summarize it with there is a lot of work to do, and it doesn't seem that many of the EU's current leaders have innovative ideas about how to bring SD / ESD into the mainline conversations... so until something happens and they start to "get it" - don't look for big changes here. Perhaps more 1-on-1 conversations throughout the day will help to change that perspective. Time now to begin working toward breakout sessions... will continue to provide updates as battery power allows.