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Linking sustainability education with the Sustainable Development Goals in K-12 schools

By Emily Hurd and Alison A. Ormsby

Sustainability education has changed identities a number of times over the last decades. How might whole-school sustainability (WSS) prepare students to address current global issues?  A focus on teaching the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) creates opportunities for students to develop systems thinking and to learn to take civic action.  We visited four schools in the United States to observe and document replicable models of K-12 WSS.  In our research, we used a mixed methods approach to code data from interviews, classroom observations, and school campus tours.  Results from a case study analysis of four K-12 schools map out pathways toward implementing and refining WSS education programs to include the SDGs, systems thinking, and civic action.

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U.S. Department of Education Green Ribbon Schools Award from 2012, 2013, and 2014: Teacher Perceptions of Ecological and Democratic Principles

By Tania McKey

Abstract: The study was a descriptive and correlational quantitative study of U. S. Department of Education Green Ribbon Schools (ED-GRS) teachers’ perceptions of ecological and democratic principles in their schools. Descriptive statistics described the ED-GRS teachers’ perceptions of how the ecological and democratic principles operate in their schools. Correlations were used to look deeper at the ecological and democratic principles and to what extent these principles were related. Teachers in ED-GRS award winning schools reported evidence of ecological and democratic principles. The findings suggested that ecological and democratic principles had a positive relationship among them. In addition, there were seven principles that had strong, positive relationships among each other as perceived by teachers in ED-GRS award winning schools. I concluded from the data that sustaining ecological change requires evidence of democratic leadership and community. This study contributes to the field of educational leadership by providing a descriptive analysis of a newly-created United States Department of Education award. In addition, this study provides schools and school leaders with information as how to make sustainable changes that lead to healthy, high performance schools including a theoretical framework to provide guidance in making the sustainable changes.

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