Environmentalism in a time between
education worlds
Re-framing the campaigning role of England's environmental educators
Since World War II there have been two great eras of education, the Beveridge inspired age of ‘optimism and trust’ that lasted from the mid-1940s to the mid-1970s, and the age of ‘markets, centralisation and managerialism’ that surfaced with the dawn of Neoliberalism and has persisted until today. Just as the first great age lost its fitness for purpose in the 1970s, the flaws inherent in this second age are increasingly apparent today.
The education system in England is on the rocks, it is floundering badly, and while it has achieved much, it is no longer fit for purpose, not in a world characterised by unpredictable and accelerating change. And so – as the old education system falls – a new one will rise, it will be the third great era of post-WWII English education.
In this collection, we examine what educators can do to help create positive environmental change, and what environmentalists can do to help shape the new era of education.
- On the cusp of change abstract / full essay web / full essay pdf
- First mate environmentalism abstract / full essay web / full essay pdf
- Power, Purpose, and Preparation in the English Education System abstract / full essay web / full essay pdf
- A Three Thirds Curriculum – a vision for education in England abstract / full essay web / full essay pdf
Abstract: On the cusp of change
As an activist or campaigner in the English education system you can operate from one of two starting points. In position ‘a’ the education system is relatively fixed, you view this era of education as being the era and one that is here to stay for the foreseeable future whether you like it or not. You focus, as a result, on securing small wins and tweaks to the existing system; the aim is to make it less bad. What if, however, in taking this fatalistic view, you were missing something major, what if the education system was not as fixed as it appears to be? What if it were on the cusp of change? This is position ‘b’, and it is fundamentally different starting position, an outlook from which the focus of your campaigning efforts would need to change considerably.
The analysis we present here, puts us in position ‘b’. We believe that a new era of education is about to arrive. We are, to paraphrase Zachary Stein, in a time between education worlds. It is in recognition of this that we call – elsewhere in this collection – on our colleagues to adopt ‘First Mate Environmentalism’ as a guiding principle in the design and delivery of their campaign and advocacy work. In this essay we highlight the signs that show us that we are on the cusp of change – England is headed for a third great era of post-WWII education.
Abstract: First Mate environmentalism
The new era of education is set to emerge. It will, inevitability, be a ship that is built as it sails. That ship is already edging away from the harbour wall. We, the environmental movement, need to pay attention. We need to send a healthy contingent of activists and campaigners to the harbour wall now, and we need them to jump on board the ship ASAP. If we don’t, we will end up – late to the party – on a very crowded main deck, and nowhere near those with their hands on the tiller. If we arrive even later, we will miss the boat entirely (as we have before) and be left behind in the choppy water, clutching desperately at lifebuoys – if any are thrown.
Getting on board early is essential, but the role we assume once there is what’s critical. So, what should that role be? This is the question we seek to answer here.
Firstly, we can say with some certainty that, even if we boarded first, we will not be the ones with our hands on the tiller when the ship leaves port: it will not be out-and-out environmentalists who shape the new era of English education. The environmental sector is neither powerful, influential, nor – sadly – respected enough, to play such a role. But, how close can we get to those who will be setting the course?
Right now, the role we look most likely to assume, is the one we have always defaulted to. We will be down on a crowded main deck calling out to whoever will listen for 'more climate education', 'more outdoor learning', 'more natural history', ‘more eco-clubs’, ‘more solar panels’. None of these calls should be dismissed, but if we want to secure the place – and more importantly the outcomes – of environmental and/or sustainability education in the new era of education, we may be wiser to pursue a different role. The role of ‘first mate’.
Abstract: Power, Purpose, and Preparation in the English Education System
The education system in England is outdated, centrally controlled, and hindering efforts to address the emerging climate and ecological crisis. As explored elsewhere in this collection, it is also a system that is on the cusp of era-defining change. But what does it need to change to? As environmentalists, our instinct is to call for a redefinition of the purpose of education. Instead of an education system that serves to promote individualism, competition, and consumerism, we ask for one that serves the purpose of sustainable development, net zero, environmental regeneration, and various other buzzwords.
However, replacing one purpose with another, may not be the best way forward. In fact, setting out to educate for anything, even something we consider ‘good’ (like sustainability), is highly problematic. It blocks off the development of something core to our being as humans, something key to unlocking the scale of societal transformation that is now so evidently required.
When we, as educators, set out to educate for something, what we are doing is colonial. Whether we intend to be or not, it is an attempt to colonise learning spaces, and learner’s minds with ways of thinking, ideas, values, and worldviews that we (the so-called experts) judge to be right. In doing this we are denying something that is integral to education, we are inhibiting learners from learning to think for themselves, we are teaching them to think like us. It is, to quote Bob Jickling, a repugnant act.
And so, as an new era of education emerges, we must argue the case for teacher and learner autonomy, for decentralisation of power, and for an education system that nurtures young people’s ability to think for themselves. In doing so, we will – by default – be educating our way towards a happy, healthier planet.
Abstract: A Three Thirds Curriculum – a vision for education in England
Despite the education system being so clearly unfit for purpose, the environmental sector continues – in the main – to only make humble calls for schools to be incrementally ‘greened’ and tends to focus more on the fabric of the buildings and grounds than on the teaching and learning that goes on in and around them. Doing this may win us some minor reforms, but these will not be enough; ‘winning slowly is the same as losing’ as Bill McKibben famously observed. We need to be bold. The education system is on the cusp of change, that change needs to be a transformation. The new era of education needs to meet the critical nature of the moment we are living through and prepare the ground for a better future. An education system revolution is needed.
In essence, what we are calling for is a resurgence and deepening of democracy. Presented here is a provocation. It is a brief sketch - a vision - of a lightly instrumentalised and greatly decentralised education system. We present it as an antidote to today’s increasingly centralised and instrumentalised situation, and as one possible alternative future that lies beyond today’s education system inflection point.
Our vision is of an education system that is vastly more democratic. It will afford far greater levels of autonomy to teachers, learners, and the communities they are embedded in, while still having a National curriculum, albeit a less suffocating and centrally controlled one.
Global Action Plan’s vision of a new education system for England deviates significantly from what currently exists; it is more locally and personally controlled and only lightly instrumentalised. We have a vision of an education system that splits responsibility for what is taught in schools more equally, so that (i) the State, (ii) the local community, and (iii) teachers and learners all have a meaningful say over what is taught in schools.
Under this new arrangement, a third of what is taught in our schools would be generated at a national level, the local community would decide a further third, with the remaining third decided by teachers and learners. There would therefore be a National Curriculum, a Local Curriculum, and a Hyper-local Curriculum. Schools would devote an equal amount of time to the teaching of all three.
If you'd like to talk to us more about the opportunities for change in the education system, please get in touch: [email protected]