Tomorrow today; 2010 - unesdoc - Unesco

identified. 8 These agents of change, located in five teacher educationinstitutions in Queensland, undertook action research tomainstream ESD within their particular system. By doing so, eachparticipating group increased its capacity to bring about change.Other outcomes of this project included the development of departmentalpolicies, student involvement in education for sustainabledevelopment forums, and enhanced skills amongst their fellowteacher educators. The Stage 3 project 9 built upon Stages 1 and2 to implement the mainstreaming of education for sustainabledevelopment in teacher education in New South Wales and theAustralian Capital Territory.Drawing on this research, ARIES suggests the following fiveenabling actions for mainstreaming education for sustainability inpre-service teacher education:• Collaborate and create partnerships with curriculum developers,policymakers and teacher accreditation bodies• Develop an ethos of sustainable practice – it is importantto ‘walk the talk’ at all levels of the system, from classroom tonational policy• Connect existing sustainability content – drawing it togethercan increase its influence• Create time and opportunities – people need time to havenew conversations and collaborate if they are to embed ESD intotheir policies• Provide experiential learning to encourage students to focuson ESD and to develop their own personal understanding of itsrelevance.Sustainability education in business schoolsA key theme of the National Action Plan is to foster sustainabilityin business and industry. Through partnerships, the intention is tobuild capacity to plan, adopt appropriate frameworks and tools, andharness incentives to make changes for sustainability.ARIES has focused on pre-service teacher educationImage: ARIESTo take ESD into the business sector, ARIES createdand facilitated change towards sustainability in thelearning and teaching focus of five Australian businessschools aand operations and their partner corporations.The specific focus of the research was the MBAprogramme within the participating business schools.The ARIES programme 10 brought together sustainabilitychampions from business schools in partnershipwith corporations across Australia in a collaborativeprocess of learning-based change to develop theirunderstanding of sustainability and accelerate changeto achieve tangible sustainability outcomes.Business schools, in collaboration with the partnercorporations, mainstreamed subject content aboutsustainability and experiential learning processes intotheir core and elective courses. Some even introducednew degree programmes in sustainability. They alsocreated opportunities for their students to undertakepractical sustainability projects with their corporatepartners.As a result of this project, specialist courses onsustainability were revised or introduced; there werehigher levels of engagement between the corporate partnersand their employees and the wider community;corporate partners reviewed their leadership, corporatesocial responsibility and supply chains; there wasan increased understanding of the learning benefits oflinking operational practice in sustainability to teachingcontent; and networks that supported sustainabilityrelatedcurriculum development were formed.Accounting for sustainabilityThe business world is under growing pressure toinstitute various forms of corporate sustainability.Government, employees, investors, customers and thegeneral public are now demanding more responsibleand transparent corporate behaviour. Accountancy isregarded as one of the professions with the most immediateimpact on sustainability, through its links witha wide range of industries and economic activities. InAustralia, as in other countries, there are now moves tointegrate sustainability into the range of advisory, regulatory,reporting and financial services that accountantsprovide, both in-house and externally.ARIES is working with the professional accountancyassociations, accountancy schools in universities,key government departments, leading accountancyfirms and other stakeholders to foster change towardssustainability in this profession.During this project, 11 ARIES created new avenuesfor dialogue by facilitating an inaugural roundtablemeeting which brought together representatives of theaccounting profession, government, business, industry,the finance sector, professional groups and universities.This roundtable exchange clearly illustrated the needfor universities and the national professional associationsto engage in a more productive level of dialoguewith regard to embedding key skills for sustainability inaccounting education and professional development. In[ 152 ]