Education for sustainability: Integrating climate change and energy into lifelong learning initiatives for small island developing states

Abstract

Human resources resemble a crucial bottleneck in certain parts of the world, as a lack of qualified human resources can hinder the introduction of renewable and energy efficient technologies, as well as the wider application of appropriate technology and, even more importantly, maintenance of those technologies. Concerning capacity building, for example in the field of sustainable energy, recommendations include the use of lifelong learning measures such as dedicated capacity building and continuous professional development programmes, or the extension of curricula to better prepare learners for employment in green economic sectors. These short and longer-term measures should focus on building interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary skills and knowledge as required in sustainability related jobs. This chapter addresses the challenges and opportunities which open online interventions, such as massive open online courses (MOOCs), combined with open educational resources (OER), can offer to provide wider and free access to interdisciplinary high quality knowledge provision. An area for which this is in high demand is energy access, energy security and energy efficiency (EASE) and its relation to climate change, for which there is a growing demand across professions and age levels, and a deficit especially in the developing world. This will be illustrated through the key online component of a dedicated lifelong learning model developed by the European funded EDULINK project L3EAP (short for “Lifelong Learning for Energy Access, Security and Efficiency in African and Pacific Small island Developing States”). It is argued that approaches like the L3EAP mentored MOOC have the potential to play an important role in building and strengthening human capacities in less developed regions of the world, where awareness of and knowledge about sustainable energy technologies and climate change can be lacking. The authors conclude that embracing ICT solutions can be a valuable cross-cutting measure to address the lack of human capacity in distant, less developed and remote locations, such as Small Island Developing States (SIDS), which may constrain a quicker uptake of sustainable energy technologies.