Outcomes
Embedding Education for Global Citizenship and Sustainable Development (EGCSD) in Initial Teacher Education and Training Courses
A three year joint project between the
World Education Centre and School of Education, University of Wales, Bangor
THE FINAL REPORT
March 2004
Outcomes
Embedding Education for Global Citizenship and Sustainable Development (EGCSD) in
Initial Teacher Education and Training Courses
A three-year joint project between the World Education Centre and
School of Education, University of Wales, Bangor
April 2001 – March 2004
Funded by the Department for International Development (DFID),
Oxfam and Christian Aid
FINAL REPORT
The Project Team
Director: Professor Leslie J. Francis
Project Officer: Sheila J. Bennell
Research Officer: Dr Mandy Robbins
Resources Officer: Sam Jackson
Steering Committee
Chair: Professor H. Gareth Ff. Roberts
Professor Leslie J. Francis
Eleri Elliott, Chair, World Education Centre
John Murray, DFID
Ian Barr, DFID consultant
Cynrig Hughes, School of Education
Catherine Hester, Oxfam in Wales
Elenid Jones, Christian Aid, followed by
Eirian Samuel, Christian Aid
Gerald Hewitson, Holyhead High School
Dafydd Idriswyn Roberts, Head Teacher, Ysgol Llanfairpwllgwyngyll
School of Education Focus Group
Jessica Clapham
Ruth Davies
Lorna Herbert Egan
Cynrig Hughes
Elen Huws
Bryn Tomos
Gwenan Williams
The report was written by Sheila Bennell, Project Officer,
on behalf of the Project Team
Acknowledgements
Thanks to:
All who took part in the project, including members of the committees, staff in the School of Education, students and teachers; Eleri Elliott who was responsible for the original idea of the project and for getting it started in the first few months; Professor Leslie Francis for his support, advice and proof reading, Professor Gareth Roberts for support and guidance; Lester Bath for her administrative assistance; and DFID, Oxfam Wales and Christian Aid for funding the project.
First published 2004 by
The World Education Centre, University of Wales, Bangor,
Normal Site, Holyhead Road, Bangor, Gwynedd LL57 2PX
www.bangor.ac.uk/addysgbyd
Copyright © Sheila J Bennell, 2004
Mae’r adroddiad hwn ar gael yn Gymraeg / This report is available in Welsh.
CONTENTS
Executive Summary
Chapter One: INTRODUCTION …………………………….. 1
1.1 The key question …………………………………………………… 1
1.2 Aims ………………………………………………………………….. 2
1.3 Objectives …………………………………………………………… 3
Chapter Two: THE PROJECT CONTEXT ………………… 5
2.1 The UK national context …………………………………………… 5
2.2 The Welsh context …………………………………………………. 6
2.3 The Welsh educational context …………………………………… 6
2.4 The local context : profile of the project partners ……………….. 9
Chapter 3: THE PROCESS …………………………………. 11
3.1 Project Personnel and management structure ………………….. 11
3.2 Baseline surveys ……………………………………………………. 11
3.3 Introduction to activities ……………………………………………. 12
3.4 Work with staff in School of Education …………………………… 13
3.5 Work with students …………………………………………………. 16
3.6 Work towards promoting a whole school ethos …………………. 19
3.7 Work with partnership schools …………………………………….. 19
3.8 Work with ITET establishments and education …………………… 21
organisations in Wales and the UK
Chapter Four: THE OUTCOMES
4.1 Introduction ………………………………………………………….. 25
4.2 Outcomes in the School of Education ……………………………. 25
4.3 Whole School Ethos outcomes ……………………………………. 36
4.4 Outcomes of work with partnership schools and LEAs …………. 37
4.5 Outcomes from work with students ……………………………….. 41
4.6 Outcomes from collaboration with ITET institutions and
educational organisations in Wales and the UK ………………….. 46
Chapter 5: DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS ………….. 49
REFERENCES …………………………………………………… 57
APPENDICES
Appendix 1: Statements from guidance documents relating to ITET in Wales
Appendix 2: Extracts from Welsh Curriculum guidance documents
Appendix 3: Timeline of key meetings and activities
Appendix 4: BEd documentation
Appendix 5: Primary PGCE documentation
Appendix 6: Secondary PGCE documentation
Appendix 7: BSc Design and Technology documentation
Appendix 8: MA module outline
Appendix 9: Documents relating to whole School of Education ethos
Appendix 10: Information sent to mentors
Appendix 11: Documents relating to ITET collaboration in Wales
Appendix 12: Resources
Appendix 13: Documents relating to student work
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This is the sixth, and final, report of a three year project between the World Education Centre and the School of Education, University of Wales, Bangor with the aim of embedding education for global citizenship and sustainable development (EGCSD) in programmes involved with Initial Teacher Education and Training (ITET). The project worked with four ITET courses, two undergraduate, and two postgraduate. The report draws together the processes and outcomes of the project, and discusses whether the project has achieved its aims and objectives. The UK, Welsh and local contexts of the project are described.
The process involved working in four areas, with staff in the School of Education, with ITET students, at whole School and University level, with school-based mentors and with the ITET communities in Wales and the UK. A baseline survey was conducted with students at the start of the project. Methods of working in the campus-base part of the courses included: resource provision and promotion, an initial course audit; discussions with Course Directors, subject teams and a variety of staff seminars. Students were supported with resources and advice, introductory lectures. School mentors were also supported with resources, advice and INSET training. A conference for ITET practitioners in Wales was organised.
The outcomes show increased awareness of EGCSD, resulting in staff taking ownership of EGCSD, developing new course content, writing it into documentation, and initiating new projects. For example, the undergraduate courses planned integrated, progressive content across the three years of the course; the Secondary PGCE planned EGCSD across both campus-based and school-based parts of the course; and Primary PGCE students took part in an innovative school-based project about links between Wales and Jamaica. Several initiatives, such as the University’s new Sustainability Policy were identified as having a potential positive effect on whole school ethos.
Students and teachers also showed a raised awareness of EGCSD, with increased resource borrowing and requests for advice. Resource borrowing and WEC website use increased markedly during the project. Students felt especially supported in the campus-based part of their courses. Some students reported having excellent opportunities in school; however, many some felt that this component of their course was not yet completely supportive to EGCSD. Several students produced excellent special studies and there was evidence that these played a role in raising awareness of staff and mentors..
A strong collaborative atmosphere has now been established in ITET in Wales. A group has been set up by UCET-Cymru (The Universities Council for the Education of Teachers in Wales) to develop generic and adaptable materials for ITET in Wales. Materials from the Bangor project will be fed into this project.
The report outlines a set of recommendations for embedding EGCSD in ITET courses.
Introduction
Chapter One
INTRODUCTION
This is the sixth, and final, report of a three year project between the World Education Centre and the School of Education, University of Wales, Bangor with the aim of embedding education for global citizenship and sustainable development (EGCSD) in programmes involved with Initial Teacher Education and Training (ITET). It draws together the processes and outcomes described in Reports 1-5 of the project, and discusses whether the project has achieved its aims and objectives.
1.1 The Key Question
Do newly qualified teachers enter schools with the ability and confidence to prepare their pupils to live in an interdependent, multicultural and sustainable world? When they are training to be teachers do they have:
· opportunities to develop their own awareness and understanding of the issues involved;
· opportunities to examine their own and others’ values and attitudes;
· opportunities to explore, gain skills, and practise ways of introducing these issues in the classroom, including through their specialist subject?
To ensure that this happens are the following components in place in their Initial Teacher Education and Training (ITET) course.
· Are ITET tutors aware of the issues and capable of introducing them?
· Are course components in place to ensure that all students will have sufficient opportunities to develop competencies?
· Are school experience mentors aware of the issues and capable of providing a supportive environment for students to practise their skills?
· Are suitable resources available to ITET staff, students and schools, to support the issues?
This project set out to examine these issues in initial teacher education and training courses in a Welsh context. It aimed to:
· examine the situation of EGCSD in one ITET establishment, namely the University of Wales Bangor;
· explore possibilities to embed EGCSD fully in its ITET courses;
· disseminate results to; and collaborate with other ITET institutions in Wales and the UK.
The project fitted into a strategy for global citizenship in ITET in Wales. It also formed the Welsh strand of the Department for International Development’s UK strategy in the four nations to bring a global dimension into ITET in the UK.
The project aims and objectives are described below.
1.2 Aims
The aims of the project were:
· to develop an effective, sustainable and replicable model for embedding education for global citizenship and sustainable development in Initial Teacher Education and Training (ITET) courses in Wales;
· to contribute to an effective strategy to support implementation of global citizenship in schools in Wales.
To be effective, EGCSD would also have to be integrated so that all students, whatever their subject area, had opportunities to explore and practise it in both college and school-based experience.
To be sustainable, the following would need to be achieved,
· Ownership of EGCSD would have to be transferred from the project team to ITET teaching staff and mentors.
· EGCSD would also have to be incorporated in such a way that it became a natural, integrated part of a course, rather than an add-on extra.
· Changes to course content would have to be reflected in changes to course documentation; this would ensure continuity of content regardless of who was teaching.
· Changes would, ideally, be written into School of Education Policy.
To be replicable,
· the project would have to develop transferable examples of practice, such as examples of individual sessions, assignments, module design and course design which could be adapted for use in ITET courses elsewhere;
· the process used for embedding EGCSD would have to be replicable.
The project will be discussed under Processes and Outcomes. This situation was not about courses having to adapt to new curricular or ITET Standard. (As noted above, at the start of the project many of the guidance materials described above, had not been published.) It was more about encouraging those involved in ITET to re-examine its true educational aims. Therefore, the way in which the project was developed, i.e. the process, was going to be of utmost importance.
It would also have to promote the role of EGCSD in developing informed, responsible, global citizens and teachers, as well as emphasising the positive value of EGCSD in providing an interesting, motivating environment for learning. It would also have to find out whether staff in the School of Education, and school mentors, considered that these issues were important enough to include in their teaching. It would also have a role in convincing policy-makers in ITET that EGCSD is a valuable dimension to include.
1.3 Objectives
In order to achieve its aims, the project formulated the following objectives.
Objective 1: To raise awareness of education for global citizenship and sustainable development within the School of Education, University of Wales, Bangor.
Objective 2: To identify where education for global citizenship can be embedded in the ITET courses, with a focus on new curriculum requirements.
Objective 3: To identify support needs of tutors and students and respond to them.
Objective 4: To supply tutors with documented examples of good practice in teaching global citizenship in designated PSE sessions, within subject studies, and through whole school approaches, in primary and secondary schools.
Objective 5: To document exemplars of effective development education practice in ITET courses and disseminate these to other ITET departments in Wales. (This was extended to include collaboration with the other DFID-funded projects in Northern Ireland, Scotland and England).
Objective 6: To disseminate the project report to NGOs involved in development education and to institutions in Wales concerned with curriculum development and implementation of schools policy, including ACCAC, the Schools Performance Unit and relevant advisory groups of the Welsh Assembly Government.
The report will examine:
· the context in which the project took place;
· the process that the project employed (the methods);
· the outcomes which occurred;
· what effect any changes have on students;
· whether any lessons can be learned about embedding Education for Global Citizenship and Sustainable Development in Initial Teacher Education and Training courses.
DFID has also commissioned an external evaluation report of the project. This will be available in a separate document.
4
Introduction
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