Monitoring and evaluating Education for Sustainable Development in universities: a new Framework
Measuring, monitoring and evaluating Education for Sustainable Development is an important task. It helps us to show where we are at, the impact we’re having, and find out what and where we need to improve.
As part of a QAA funded Collaborative Enhancement project, the University of St Andrews; in partnership with EAUC Scotland, Learning for Sustainability Scotland, sparqs, SOS UK, and University of Edinburgh, have developed a flexible 6-step Framework that provides guidance on monitoring and evaluating ESD in higher education – including looking at mapping, quality, depth, and impacts.
The outcomes also include a handbook and two workshops run by QAA. The workshops were run on 21 June 2023.
Workshop 1 focused on:
- increasing awareness of the Framework among senior managers with a responsibility for education, including for example Vice Principals
- giving them an overview of how the Framework works
- increasing institutional buy-in for ESD; to allow for the support and encouragement of staff to monitor and evaluate their work.
Workshop 2 focused on:
- increasing awareness of the Framework with those who will be directly coordinating or running the monitoring of sustainability in learning and teaching, e.g. curriculum leads or programme coordinators, as well as general sustainability officers/leads with a responsibility or interest in teaching.
- facilitates the sharing of experiences in enabling ESD and discussion of how the Framework might be adapted in individual institutions.
The Handbook will be available in due course – watch this space!