Educators have invested considerable effort in developing environmental education programs that address students' knowledge, attitudes, and action competence regarding environmental issues. The authors explore the effectiveness of such programs in terms of both student learning outcomes and the intergenerational influence that results when students discuss their learning experiences with their parents and other community members. Six environmental education programs involving 284 students in Queensland schools, from Grades 5-12, were investigated. Students and their parents were surveyed and interviewed regarding their perceptions about the program, the program's influence on their environmental learning, and the extent and nature of discussions that the program stimulated between students and their parents. The authors draw conclusions about key features that should be incorporated into environmental education programs to encourage and empower students to bring about environmental change in their homes and communities.
Abstract This paper explores some of the ideas that underlie different conceptions of sustainable development. It suggests the notion of ‘sustainable living’ may provide direction for the role of environmental education in the transition towards a sustainable society. Aspects of the emerging concept of ‘education for sustainable living’ are used to analyse some widely-held assumptions about environmental education practice. In doing so the paper seeks to contribute to the process of identifying a vision and practice appropriate to environmental education for a new millennium.
One warm spring day last October, we shared a park bench in Queensland, Australia, and challenged each other with questions about the future of our field. What might environmental educators change in their programs to be able to call them education for sustainability if they choose to support the upcoming Decade? Martha asked. Why should they need to change anything? John queried. Aren't many approaches to environmental education already contributing to education for sustainable development?
Climate change is generating economic and environmental threats with the pressures set to increase in the coming years. However, these threats also provide opportunities for those cities and regions that seek to address climate change by pursuing lower emission technologies. Where environmental concerns were once associated with problems of high costs and inefficiency, responding to the climate crisis is now rapidly becoming a high-growth industry where profits and returns are increasingly attractive. Research by the Environmental Protection Department identified electricity generation, property development, construction, transport and hospitality as 'carbon-vulnerable' industries in Hong Kong, China. This chapter has identified the potential workforce skills needed for Hong Kong, China, in these industries to create new and alternative economic opportunities through a shift to low-carbon technologies, aiming at identifying the changes in vocational training that are required to respond to the skills needs of industry and businesses resulting from climate change.
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