Transformative Education empowers learners of all ages with the knowledge, skills, values and attitudes to address the interconnected global challenges we are facing. Students are aware of issues such as climate change, environmental degradation, loss of biodiversity, poverty and inequality.
The types of outcomes of transformative education are beneficial in the goal towards having a society where citizens feel responsible and active in building inclusive, peaceful and sustainable societies. Also, young people are better suited to integrate the labour market, where skills such as working efficiently with others, understanding complex issues and situations, working in a multicultural environment, being empathetic and result-oriented are increasingly required.
How does transformative education work?
Challenges like climate change, violent and hateful ideologies, mass loss of biodiversity, new conflicts and the risks of global pandemics are putting the world in an unprecedent position.
In this context, transformative education can be part of the solution. Education must be designed in a way that fosters economic growth and tackles systemic unemployment; poverty; civic disengagement; disease epidemics; local and global citizenship, political instability, deforestation among other societal issues. Education must move towards making young citizens more suited for interconnected competitive global economies while sustaining natural resources.
Learners must engage with the world and find coherence between the world they experience in school and the world we want to build for the benefit of society. This involves teaching and learning to motivate and empower students to take informed decisions and actions at the individual, community and global levels.
To achieve this, teachers must transform their teaching, for example, ensuring that the curriculum, pedagogy, learning materials, schools or learning environments are meaningful in the natural, political, economic, and cultural contexts.
A safe learning environment is also relevant to promote transformative education. Only when students feel valued, acknowledged, safe and are included in the learning community as full and active members, transformative education can take place. In this aspect, it’s crucial to prevent violence, bullying, gender-based violence, as well as health and gender related discrimination towards learners and educators.
Key benefits of transformative education
If applied properly, it creates autonomous, independent thinkers. Among other things, transformative education teaches critical thinking skills; promotes discovery learning through project-based activities, place-based, and project-based learning; focuses on education for environmental sustainability and social justice; demonstrates collaboration as the norm; promotes cultural exchange programs; provides inclusive and personalized learning plans; creates spaces for students to analyze the world; inculcates research inquiry skills; immerses learners in transformative leadership skills for their schools and communities; encourages student-teacher partnerships; challenges students to be active rather than passive learners; and boosts computer and technological competency.
However, it’s important to know that transformative education doesn’t come easily. It requires detailed context-specific analysis, and the design and implementation of comprehensive education policies aligned with both a human-rights based approach and the very idea of transformative education.
