TY - JOUR
T1 - Education for UN Sustainable Development Goal 12
T2 - A Cross-Curricular Program for Secondary Level Students
AU - Kiely, Lisa
AU - Parajuly, Keshav
AU - Green, James A.
AU - Fitzpatrick, Colin
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © 2021 Kiely, Parajuly, Green and Fitzpatrick.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - Dealing with complex sustainability challenges requires an integrated approach to thinking and hence learning. Well-designed, integrated sustainability educational programs at the school level can have a significant positive impact on sensitizing students in this area. We present the case of a cross-curricular educational program designed and implemented at secondary level school with a focus on sustainability of material resources used in electronic products–a fast-growing sector with a significant environmental footprint. Over a 4-week period, teachers of five subjects (science, geography, business, technology and civic, social and political education) tailored their classes to focus on the topic of critical raw materials as it relates to these subjects. Examining a control group against the intervention group before and after the program, we use the New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) scale as a measure of students' environmental beliefs in order to find out the extent to which the program helped the cohort of students develop and retain such an ecological paradigm. Students' pro-NEP improved after the program, including on several facets, such as belief in limits to growth. Findings suggest that our cross-curricular approach was able to influence the young students' environmental orientation in a desirable direction.
AB - Dealing with complex sustainability challenges requires an integrated approach to thinking and hence learning. Well-designed, integrated sustainability educational programs at the school level can have a significant positive impact on sensitizing students in this area. We present the case of a cross-curricular educational program designed and implemented at secondary level school with a focus on sustainability of material resources used in electronic products–a fast-growing sector with a significant environmental footprint. Over a 4-week period, teachers of five subjects (science, geography, business, technology and civic, social and political education) tailored their classes to focus on the topic of critical raw materials as it relates to these subjects. Examining a control group against the intervention group before and after the program, we use the New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) scale as a measure of students' environmental beliefs in order to find out the extent to which the program helped the cohort of students develop and retain such an ecological paradigm. Students' pro-NEP improved after the program, including on several facets, such as belief in limits to growth. Findings suggest that our cross-curricular approach was able to influence the young students' environmental orientation in a desirable direction.
KW - consumer electronics
KW - critical raw materials
KW - new ecological paradigm
KW - SDG 12
KW - sustainability education
KW - sustainable consumption and production
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85113957797&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.3389/frsus.2021.638294
DO - 10.3389/frsus.2021.638294
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85113957797
SN - 2673-4524
VL - 2
JO - Frontiers in Sustainability
JF - Frontiers in Sustainability
M1 - 638294
ER -