Promoting Higher Education Sustainability through Teacher Ethics Development: Government Strategies for Action in China

Abstract

Higher education is imperative for the fulfillment of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), providing educational underpinning for effective economic growth and environmentally friendly innovations, which is a central pillar for enhancing global citizenship and realizing the SDGs. As the core participants and witnesses, higher education teachers are critical forces in the promotion of sustainable development in higher education and the realization of ESD 2030. For this purpose, a debate on teachers and sustainable development in higher education is essential and indispensable. Teacher professional ethics development is the essence of teacher sustainability and an impulsive motivation for engaging in ESD. However, limited exploration and research is focusing on sustainable development in higher education from the perspective of teacher ethics. Based on the Chinese context, this study selects the research perspective of teachers’ professional ethics, and adopts theoretical elaboration, and policy analysis to explore China’s governmental action strategies to promote Higher Education for Sustainable Development (HESD). The study indicates that the Chinese Government has adopted a normative, problem-oriented, and evaluation-driven action strategy to improve the long-term mechanism for building teacher ethics. This has accelerated the modernization of Chinese-style education and the realization of the global SDGs.