Select Committee on Environmental Audit Fifth Report


1  Introduction

The Scope of the Inquiry

1. On 1st November 2004, we announced our intention to appoint a Sub-committee on Environmental Education which would hold a follow-up investigation into an earlier inquiry undertaken by us, entitled Learning the Sustainability Lesson[1] . The Sub-committee on Environmental Education was established on 17th November 2004 and began taking evidence on 7th December 2004.

2. In our press release, we expressed a desire to hear responses to the following questions:

  • Has the term Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) lost its currency? Does it have any resonance with the general public? Has the environmental message been lost?
  • The DfES said in 2003 that the Sustainable Development Action Plan was supposed to signal the start of a process of change, identifying the most powerful levers - what can be achieved immediately and what can be built upon. More than a year on, can it be said that that process of change has begun and have there been any immediate achievements?
  • Government is currently reviewing the UK Sustainable Development Strategy. What should the Strategy include in order to significantly strengthen the role of learning within it?
  • Does the 14-19 Working Group's report, "14-19 Curriculum and Qualifications Reform", go far enough? Will ESD be adequately represented if this report is used as the basis for the forthcoming White Paper? What must be included in the White Paper if progress is to be made to fully integrate ESD into all aspects of learning, formal and informal?
  • In response to our last inquiry the DfES said they recognised that more could be done to embed ESD in the school curriculum and that they would lead on strengthening ESD links within geography, design and technology, science and citizenship. Has there been any discernible improvement in these areas? Is there evidence that this work has been taken forward by the DfES and its agencies?
  • The role of informal learning, including youth work, work-based learning and adult and community learning, in taking the environmental education agenda forward is key. Is the Government doing enough in these crucial areas?
  • Is there any evidence to suggest that the Government, through its stewardship of education, is getting better at getting the environmental message across to the general public? And is there any evidence to suggest that sufficient work is being done at regional and local levels to support environmental education?
  • Are there sufficient resources available to deliver the Government's commitment for sustainable development?

3. Seventy-five memoranda were received, some of which were supplementary to evidence sessions. Oral evidence was heard from fifteen individuals or organisations, including Derek Twigg MP, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools, Department for Education and Skills (DfES) in his first appearance before a Commons Select Committee. We are grateful for all the evidence given to the Sub-committee during this inquiry. In particular, we would like to thank our Special Adviser, Libby Grundy MBE, Director of the Council for Environmental Education (CEE), for her assistance.

4. We had looked forward to returning to the subject of environmental education. The DfES' response to our first inquiry had been very positive, with the Rt. Hon Charles Clarke MP, then Secretary of State for Education and Skills, taking a personal interest in taking forward Education for Sustainable Development. The creation of the DfES Sustainable Development Action Plan (SDAP) was a direct result of our first report and we were eager to see what impact the Plan had made in the intervening period. The UK Sustainable Development Strategy was also being reviewed, with a revised Strategy due to be published around March 2005. This year (2005) also marks the start of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. The time was right, we felt, to revisit this subject and evaluate the progress being made.

5. However, what became clear over the course of this inquiry was that our expectations had been too high and our optimism premature. Whilst we found some excellent pockets of progress, and certainly evidence of increased activity, the overall picture was patchy and disappointing. The question of whether or not our expectations had been unrealistically high, with regard to the SDAP in particular, we will return to later in this report. Of more immediate concern, however, was the worrying degree of disagreement, whether openly expressed or unknowingly implied, about the value of ESD and the priority it should be given by DfES in general and in the curriculum in particular. We heard from a few witnesses who quite clearly thought it unreasonable and unrealistic for us to expect ESD to have featured in the Tomlinson Working Group's final report, "14-19 Curriculum and Qualifications Reform",[2] (hereafter the Tomlinson Report). Similarly, we were told there was no reason why ESD should be included in the forthcoming DfES White Paper, to any greater degree than any other single subject; and as for expecting priority to be given to ESD as a classroom subject, this was, it seems, another naïve assumption. This is a fundamental issue and therefore we have decided to begin this report by asking the question, "Do we need to be educated about Sustainable Development?".


1   Environmental Audit Committee, Tenth Report of Session 2002-03, Learning the Sustainability Lesson, HC472 Back

2   "14-19 Curriculum and Qualifications Reform", published 18 October 2004 Back


 
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