With an ever-growing global population, limited resources, and climate change, the world needs education for sustainable development more than ever. The COVID-19 pandemic has further highlighted the increased importance of the emphasised Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) as an integral element of quality education. In this context, as part of the #OpenUpYourThinking SADC Researchers’ Challenge, a study on “Education for Sustainable Development and COVID-19 in Southern Africa” was conducted over May – September 2020. The study was led by Prof. Heila Lotz-Sisitka in the Department of Education at the Rhodes University and conducted by a team of 12 researchers across the SADC Region.
Their report showed that issues in education are intersectional, and in order to address the region’s education development agenda that seeks to achieve a harmonised education sector in ensuring sustainability, integration, resource allocation, and effective realisation of the objectives of improved access, retention, and educational outcomes, there is need to adopt a multi-sectoral approach to education and sustainable development. Drawing on diverse perspectives, the report offers recommendations that can inform a multi-levelled response and a wider systemic response to the intersecting challenges that were revealed so starkly in ways that also offer clear transformative praxis pathways for the Transforming Education for Sustainable Futures (TESF) work going forward in the SADC region.
The objectives of the webinar are to:
It offers an opportunity to discuss, debate, and engage with the key challenges underpinning ESD as an integral element of quality education within the SADC Region.
The webinar will be held as a virtual conference on 20 May 2021.
The conference is organized by JET Education Services in cooperation with and generously supported by the UNESCO Regional Office for Southern Africa (UNESCO ROSA), the SARChI Chair in Global Change and Social Learning Systems’ Transforming Education for Sustainable Futures (TESF) project at Rhodes University and the Open Society Foundation.
For additional information, please contact Carla Pereira at carla@jet.org.za or Zuki Mashigo at zukiswa@jet.org.za.
