Dutch National Network for Sustainable Development in Higher Education Curricula (DHO)

Dutch National Network for Sustainable Development in Higher Education Curricula (DHO) aims to develop learning opportunities, innovative learning environments and methodologies within higher education that enable individuals to develop competences on sustainable development. More specifically, DHO aims to stimulate such opportunities for all students within institutes of higher learning in the Netherlands.

This means that students have:

• Insight in the concept of sustainable development.
• Insight in what their discipline can contribute to sustainable development.
• The competencies to collaborate with representatives of other disciplines.
• The competencies to develop strategies to work on sustainable development in their future careers.

1. North-South, student projects on sustainable development in Asia, Africa, and Latin America: As sustainable development is a worldwide process, intercultural co-operation is essential. Such an approach, and the continuous challenge for poverty alleviation without ecological destruction is currently seen as a very important challenge by scientists, politicians, and other leading parties in the world.

The North-South project was established in January 2001, based on the idea that actual experience is the best way to equip students with the skills indicated above. Students participate in a multidisciplinary, intercultural research team in Africa, Asia or Latin America for a local organization on sustainable development. The research takes place in collaboration with a local university.

The project takes experiential learning and a student-oriented form of education as starting points. The interdisciplinary educational model is used as the basic methodology. In the research groups, about 6 to 8 Masters students from different disciplines participate. Half of the students are from the Netherlands, the other half are from the country in which the research activities take place. The research is carried out in close collaboration with a non-university organisation (a local NGO, governmental organisation or company). The focus of the research is always defined by the local organisation. The outcome of the project generates concrete recommendations that are practically applicable and have direct local relevance. This means that they must be socially acceptable, and technically and economically feasible.

2.  Challenging experts: The aim of the project is to explore the relations between various disciplines and sustainable development, and to challenge educators and university boards to integrate sustainable development into all disciplinary study programs.The best way to motivate lecturers and researchers therefore is to refer to their field of expertise, and to present sustainable development as an intellectual challenge in their field. For that reason teachers in specific disciplines were invited to describe the challenges of integrating sustainable development in their own fields, in a review of about fifty pages. The review must also contain recommendations for changing education. After the completion of a review, seminars are organized for colleagues from the faculty and from other universities. At these seminars the reviews are presented and recommendations are discussed.

3. 'Auditing Instrument for Sustainability in Higher Education' (AISHE)

Although many Universities want to integrate sustainable development as a theme into their education, they often do not know how to do it in practice. By examining all aspects of the curriculum with an AISHE - audit, a list of at least 20 substantial targets will be produced to change the curriculum towards sustainable development.

The procedure of an AISHE audit is as follows:

• A faculty or study board, dean or coordinator decides to audit a study program;
• At least one coordinator or study manager, ten teachers and three students are committed to attend the full AISHE-audit;
• A full AISHE-audit takes two meetings of half a day, two separate days or one full day;
• During the first meeting the AISHE consultants explain the audit and afterwards all participants fill in a list of 20 criteria;
• During the second "consensus" meeting all personal scores are discussed;
• The first step of the second meeting is to reach a consensus on the present situation with respect to sustainable development, the second step is to explore the desired situation and to formulate actions for improvement;
• At the end of the meeting 3 to 5 items are selected as priorities;
• All results of the meeting are typed directly into the AISHE-computer program and the results are accessible through bright and comprehensible diagrams.
• Universities may receive the certificate for sustainability in Higher Education

Besides the minimum audit, the AISHE-team offers a few extra options. Quite often participants do not have a clear idea about sustainable development. It is recommended to organize a few meetings on the basic principles of sustainable development before the first AISHE-audit takes place. After an audit the AISHE-team can offer extra tools to support the implementation of the plans put forward during the audit. It is highly recommended to audit the curriculum again after one year or two (to take note of the results established).

4. The Charter for Sustainable Development in Vocational Training is a national agreement between institutions of higher education and external parties to integrate sustainable development into education, policy and operations.

The Charter for sustainable development in vocational training has the following ambitions:

• Improving the way colleges threat the concept of sustainable development in their operations and education and improving the way to show this.
• Increase in participation and support for the 'Charter for Sustainable Development in Vocational Training'.
• Increasing partnership projects between vocational training, market (trade and industry) and institutions for scientific research.
• Improvement and increase of the collaboration between colleges and universities.

Colleges, and recently universities as well, are able to obtain the Quality Mark Sustainable Development in Higher Education. There are four different levels, indicated by stars. The Quality Mark Sustainable Development in Higher Education with one star is the most accessible quality mark, moving up until the Quality Mark with four stars.

5. Transdisciplinary education: The aim of this project is to give students working towards their master's degree the opportunity to participate in an interdisciplinary research program related to sustainable development aspects. This research project is situated in a real life setting in society. The objective is the training of competences needed to work on complex societal problems. This implies both the involvement of people with different disciplinary backgrounds and different actors from society.

The educational model is developed by the teachers participating in the project. Students with different disciplinary backgrounds and studying at different higher education institutions, form the research team. The general setup of the case is outlined clearly in a base document. Starting from this document the students have to formulate their own research proposal with consensus of all students participating. The teacher functions as a coach for the research team.

The students are supposed to get several parties engaged in their research activities. These parties include companies, citizens' organisations, NGO’s and local or national governments relevant for the project. During the project the students recognize conflicting interests and values that come into prominence when working on sustainable development in a real life situation. All parties are invited for the final presentation and their comments on the report presented are taken into account in the final assessment of the students.

6. Past, Present & Futures: This project group started in 2002 with future-embedded education in the field of sustainable development.

Goals of the project are:

Define the relation between Sustainable Development and Future Orientation;

• Work out possible future-embedded education courses;
• Connect cognitive and creative arenas;
• Dissemination of best methods and best practices;
• Stimulate and facilitate the DHO-network members to implement future oriented methods into their education;
• Exchange examples and lessons with (inter)national partners.