May 2012

  • A view from 1979 – 33 years on

    Attached is an extended version of the editorial I have contributed to the 100th edition of NAEE's Environmental Education.  Quite a milestone. The text looks back to what HMI were saying in 1979 about environmental education and the curriculum in...

  • Guardian green

    It is notoriously difficult to capture education activities focused on sustainability in a picture – quite often they look like a bunch of people sitting around talking – an accurate reflection of reality in many ways.  So well done to...

  • Pre-Rio perspiration

    Last week, the 5th International Conference of the Living Knowledge Network issued a Communiqué on Sustainability, Knowledge and Democracy – an initiative of the 'Big Tent' Group of international networks.  Some have lauded this, but I fear it's not for me....

  • 56 Up

    I viewed the first two episodes of Michael Apted's 56 Up with nervous anticipation of a wonderful TV venture – one I have been watching since the late 1970s when the early programmes were used on Bath's pre-service teacher education PGCE...

  • No such thing as a free education after all

    This week's Economist reports that the Scottish government is having to raid FE budgets (and other unspecified pots) to keep its universities afloat. Scotland may be able to write education policies, but it is still subject to financing decisions made...

  • How green is your poster?

    Here's an educational question, if not yet an existential one: should you laminate your poster, or not?   This will be a question which, for many, is a no-brainer in that it's obviously something not to do because it isn't actually...

  • Coming to a vending machine near your children

    Yesterday's Guardian reported that a survey by the School Food Trust [SFT] has shown that 89 out of 100 academies suveyed are selling high sugar / fat / salt snacks (aka junk food) that do not conform to the 2008...

  • Neither sermons nor silence

    The Green Alliance blog has an interesting post today titled: Should the [UK] government advertise the “green switchover”? 'Advertise' here means communicate to a generally unaware public through TV in order to increase adoption of green initiatives such as the Green Deal...

  • The Planet, its People and the Royal Society

    The Royal Society's recent report, People and the Planet, had not had the sort of reception its authors might have wished.  The Economist was unimpressed, branding it a curate's egg: ... it might have been nice, in adopting the first...

  • How much do you know about climate change?

    Preparing for a talk on communicating sustainable development with the public, I've been reading far too many reports than are good for me. The following is from a survey of attitudes and knowledge relating to biodiversity and the natural environment (2007...