According to national core curriculum, schools must raise environmentally aware citizens who are committed to a sustainable way of life and who are able to create social, cultural and economic wellbeing without diminishing biodiversity and natural resources and without exceeding the capacity of the natural environment.

According to national core curriculum, schools must raise environmentally aware citizens who are committed to a sustainable way of life and who are able to create social, cultural and economic wellbeing without diminishing biodiversity and natural resources and without exceeding the capacity of the natural environment.

This is a challenging task, and progress in the learning process requires many simultaneous measures. The national strategy of the sub-committee for education in the Finnish National Commission on Sustainable Development includes measures to provide support for schools to diversify their learning processes and teamwork culture.

The Finnish National Commission on Sustainable Development led by the Prime Minister was established at the beginning of 1993. The Commission coordinates national processes for sustainable development and issues opinions on global and regional sustainable development processes. The Finnish Association for Environmental Education (SYKSE) submitted an initiative in autumn 2003 to set up a sub-committee for education. The Commission decided to appoint this sub-committee for the period of May 25, 2004 to December 31, 2007. Representatives for the sub-committee were nominated by 24 parties, including the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of the Environment, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health. There is also a representative from the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities, a representative of teacher training at universities, and representatives from NGOs and businesses. The sub-committee is chaired by Kirsi Lindroos, Director General of the National Board of Education, and the deputy chair is Anna-Liisa Kiiskinen, Special Researcher at the Central Finland Environment Centre.

A sustainable way of life in a sustainable society

The sub-committee for education started by surveying the roles of various actors in sustainable development education and training and then launched its work to create a national strategy. An educational strategy to promote sustainable development and its implementation plan for the years 2006-2014 was discussed and approved at the meeting of the Finnish National Commission on Sustainable Development on March 15, 2006. The strategy is a joint plan by various parties to increase the emphasis on sustainable development in education and training and to allocate extra support to educators, teachers and trainers. In the strategy, the focus is on targets requiring extensive cooperation in educational institutions and the integration of the expertise and resources of the educational field and of other actors. Additional resources will be acquired principally from cooperation with various administrative sectors, NGOs and businesses.

The strategy vision — a sustainable way of life in a sustainable society — sums up  the objective. Education and training which promote sustainable development aim to help in the acquisition of the information, skills, conditions and vision required to adopt a sustainable way of life and in the building of a sustainable future by citizens who understand the basic conditions of sustainability. The building of a sustainable future requires the ability and the courage to assess current practices critically and to reform current practices.

What the challenge of a more comprehensive way of learning means in practice is cooperation between school subjects, the evolution of everyday routines and practices, and closer interaction with society at large. The strategy of education for sustainable development aims to support the development of a culture of teamwork and to make it easier to create links to the surrounding society. Various operational models are being planned to organize and implement cooperation, and information on good practices is being distributed to schools and their partners. Resource and development centres and the networks supporting them are important when it comes to disseminating good ideas. Cooperation enables all actors to gain experience on the building of a sustainable future in multi-professional cooperation.

Who, how, when?

Fourteen proposals for action have been recorded in the strategy, and the implementation plan describes who is responsible for the action and how and when it must be taken, according to the sub-committee for education, in order for the targets to be met.

The key areas for development are:

• Increase the emphasis on sustainable development in education policy and in the basic and continuing education of teachers; sustainable development to be made a focus area in education strategies and early education strategies; and support to be provided for the strategies of other administrative sectors and players.
• A resource and innovation centre functioning as a regional centre of the United Nations University in Tokyo to be established at a teacher training department.
• Establish contact between different administrative sectors and other key players at the government level as an aim for methodical allocation of resources and expertise to the areas of development that are presented in the strategy.
• Strengthening and organizing the cooperation between different administrative sectors and other key players also at the local and regional level with the aim of providing long-term support for child daycare centres, schools and educational institutions in their promotion of sustainable development.
• Create a network of development centres for all regions by strengthening the resources of existing organizations.
• Develop teaching materials and guides to meet the needs of the teaching of sustainable development and to support multi-professional cooperation in the operations of schools, between schools and between schools and other actors.
• Distribute and establish by developmental research, for example, methods of participation and influence that have been proven to be well-developed and effective.
• Extend the learning environment to society with the aim of ensuring that all schools have functioning models of cooperation with external parties in 2014.
• Use and develop the possibilities provided by new technology.
• Extend the environmental certification of schools to include the social and cultural dimension of sustainable development. The aim is for all schools to have an action plan for sustainable development by 2010 and for 15% to have received external accreditation or certification of their activities by 2014.
• Implement the measures of support that have been presented, and monitor and assess the results.

Marja-Leena Loukola

The author is the Counsellor of Education responsible for sustainable development at the National Board of Education.