The Global University Network for Innovation (GUNI) has announced the 5th International Barcelona Conference on Higher Education “Higher Education’s Commitment with Sustainability: From Understanding to Action” to be held on 23-26 November 2010 at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in Barcelona, Spain.
The UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014) proposes the integration of the principles, values and practices of sustainable development into all aspects of education and learning. After 5 years, principles such as inter-disciplinarity, networking or the local focus of knowledge, form the basis of the language on which new references are being built for education.
According to GUNI announcement, today everyone is able to document the interrelation between the various environmental, social, economic and human problems, as well as the linkage between the poverty of some and the infeasibility of an expansive economic model, unaware of the limits of others.
We start having a global map of the world's problems and its causes, and this allows us to affirm that we advocate the introduction of sustainability into our way of inhabiting the Earth. So when we talk about sustainability we actually mean a new paradigm from which new forms of life, relationships and understandings will emerge.
In the same line the Communiqué issued by the World Conference on Higher Education (UNESCO, 2009) emphasized the social responsibility of higher education that derives from its value as a public good.
The global education agenda should contribute, as the text states, to the eradication of poverty and sustainable development and to progress towards the internationally agreed upon developmental goals, that include Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and Education for All (EFA).
The 5th International Barcelona Conference on Higher Education is designed to deepen the conceptual definition of the lines of change in higher education to respond to the paradigm of sustainability. It will also strive to identify ways for action that facilitate the transition from existing to new educational scenarios.
The Conference will include parallel working sessions in two areas: The first one will be a space for exchanging experiences and good practices to analyze how the world regions are advancing with the introduction of sustainability. In the second one the participants will discuss and propose ways to transform higher education.
The discussions and conclusions of the conference, including the papers dealing with the best experiences and good practices, will be later published in a collection titles Higher Education in the World.
For additional and more updated information, please click here.
The UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014) proposes the integration of the principles, values and practices of sustainable development into all aspects of education and learning. After 5 years, principles such as inter-disciplinarity, networking or the local focus of knowledge, form the basis of the language on which new references are being built for education.
According to GUNI announcement, today everyone is able to document the interrelation between the various environmental, social, economic and human problems, as well as the linkage between the poverty of some and the infeasibility of an expansive economic model, unaware of the limits of others.
We start having a global map of the world's problems and its causes, and this allows us to affirm that we advocate the introduction of sustainability into our way of inhabiting the Earth. So when we talk about sustainability we actually mean a new paradigm from which new forms of life, relationships and understandings will emerge.
In the same line the Communiqué issued by the World Conference on Higher Education (UNESCO, 2009) emphasized the social responsibility of higher education that derives from its value as a public good.
The global education agenda should contribute, as the text states, to the eradication of poverty and sustainable development and to progress towards the internationally agreed upon developmental goals, that include Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and Education for All (EFA).
The 5th International Barcelona Conference on Higher Education is designed to deepen the conceptual definition of the lines of change in higher education to respond to the paradigm of sustainability. It will also strive to identify ways for action that facilitate the transition from existing to new educational scenarios.
The Conference will include parallel working sessions in two areas: The first one will be a space for exchanging experiences and good practices to analyze how the world regions are advancing with the introduction of sustainability. In the second one the participants will discuss and propose ways to transform higher education.
The discussions and conclusions of the conference, including the papers dealing with the best experiences and good practices, will be later published in a collection titles Higher Education in the World.
For additional and more updated information, please click here.
