Rethinking Schooling for the 21st Century

need for more sophisticated approaches to curriculum design that encourage
classroom engagement with diverse perspectives on current affairs, supported
by resources — such as electronic and print media — judiciously sourced by
teachers themselves.
Geography, history and current economic,
environmental, social and political issues weigh
heavily on the meaningful implementation of ESD/
GCED in Southeast Asia. Education does not, and
cannot, operate in isolation from the broader
political and social context. When the broader
context is either explicitly or implicitly antipathetic
to concepts and values embedded in SDG Target 4.7,
Education does not,
and cannot, operate
in isolation from the
broader political and
social context
the superficial insertion of ESD/GCED into policy, curricula, teacher education
and student assessment may not only prove meaningless, but actually distract
from or undermine progress towards more fundamental reform. Governments
must ensure that education becomes an enabler, rather than an obstacle, to
achieving transformation towards peace and sustainable development — while
recognising that this is a complex and challenging task that requires far more
than the insertion of a few choice phrases into official policy documents.
PEACE, SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND
GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP IN EDUCATION POLICY AND
CURRICULA
To a large extent, the state of ESD/GCED in Southeast Asia mirrors the regional
and global situation. While at national level there is general awareness of, and
in some cases commitment to, most aspects of ESD/GCED, it is constrained by
a number of challenges noted in various UNESCO reports, including the lack of
understanding, capacity and collaboration on the part of educational stakeholders
to implement it (see, for example, UNESCO, 2014c). In many societies, problems
with ensuring implementation of official policy are by no means restricted to ESD/
GCED. In Indonesia, for example, governmental programs are less successfully
implemented in remote parts of the country. 44 In Viet Nam, the general quality
of teaching has been adjudged poor, often outdated, overly abstract, and widely
variable across different areas of the country (Prime Minister of the National
Assembly of Viet Nam, 2012). And although environmental education projects
have been in progress since 1986 45 in Viet Nam, there has been little followthrough
in terms of incorporating relevant messages into school textbooks.
This is partly due to the lack of collaboration between different state bodies:
44 The government is trying to address this issue through the Nawa Cita (Nine Dreams) programme
or the 2015-2019 National Mid Term Development Plan, which includes ‘building
Indonesia from the remote, outer areas by strengthening the regions and rural villages in the
framework of unity of nation’ as one of its nine major goals (Indonesia, 2014).
45 See https://aeeid.asean.org/environmental-education-in-the-schools-of-viet-nam-project-vie98018/.
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Chapter 4: Southeast Asia