I’m Dr. Glenn Strachan, I’ve been a tutor on the education for sustainability course
since 2002, and i'm currently the acting course director.
The master's degree for education for sustainability is concerned with the communication and the
education of social, environmental and economic issues associated with sustainable development.
The majority of the students take the course on a part time distance learning basis with
three modules in year one, three modules in year two and the dissertation in the final
year. There is also the full time option for the course, which involves taking all 6 academic
modules in one year with the dissertation to follow after that. The modules span a range
of issues including education theory, the nature of sustainability, climate change education,
values and participation, science and culture and research methods. Because most of the
students are practicing in this field or hoping to do so in the future our assessments are
designed so they can contribute to the professional practice to the students involved.
Students choose this course because it is unique, it was the first and is still one
of the only masters programmes in education for sustainability, the course was developed
by practitioners from a group of UK NGOs and it was done so in response to the first earth
summit in Rio in 1992, to provide a professional development course for teachers interested
in sustainable development. The tutors on the course are also practitioners in education
for sustainability, most of them have roles outside the university, which means they can
bring their updated experience from their teaching from their research and from their
consultancy work into the content of the specific modules that they teach.
The course is delivered through the online learning environment moodle which means we have students from all around
the world taking part in the course this means there is an opportunity to share learning
and to communicate with a diverse range of participants.
Graduates from the education for sustainability programme are looking to either advance their
careers in this field or they're looking to change their careers and break into this field.
We have graduates who are working for UNICEF in sierra leone, for the british council in
nigeria, we have graduates who are working for environmental or public health NGOs in
the UK, in Malta, in Kenya, in Botswana. We Have graduates who are working for ministries
of education in Lesotho, in namibia, in Malawi and we also have graduates who are either
teachers or education officers in schools or in universities, in museums and even in
national parks in a wide range of countries including the UK; Zambia, Kenya and Uganda.
The education for sustainability MSc for anybody in the public sector, in the private sector
or in civil society who is involved in communicating aspects of sustainable development and its
also ideal for anybody who is concerned with the issues associated with the UN sustainable development goals.