Sustainability Framework for School Self-Assessment “Jump into Sustainable Lifestyle” Erasmus Project

Project Title

Sustainability Framework for School Self-Assessment “Jump into Sustainable Lifestyle”

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for school education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Social/environmental responsibility of educational institutions; Civic engagement / responsible citizenship; Environment and climate change

Project Summary

Global problems such as climate change, poverty, fresh water scarcity, waste, health problems are becoming critical and continue to put pressure on our societies. These complex global problems put all of us in front of new challenges and require fundamental changes in what has to be learned and how that learning is to happen.

Multiple sources of evidence show that being a sustainable school raises standards and enhances young people’s well‐being. The research evidence supports the idea that this is because sustainable schools engage young people in their learning so improving motivation and behaviour, promote healthy school environments and lifestyles. In addition, sustainable school’s advance community cohesion by making valuable connections between the school, parents and carers and the wider community.

Researches say that the evaluation system of the schools is the main instrument to increase transparency, social disclosure and to increase the managerial culture, also can play as a tool to build a path to sustainable development. Even though there are numerous tools assessing ecological footprint, mostly they reflect only one aspect of sustainability. Not only project countries but the whole of Europe is lacking holistic, easy to use and effective methods and tools to evaluate schools’ sustainability and identify areas for improvement.

The goal of this project is to provide a clear and compelling offer of support to schools in the project countries, in order to help and encourage them to put sustainability at the heart of what they do.

The objectives would be:
– Together with partner organizations to develop a holistic sustainability framework for school self-evaluation “Jump into Sustainable Lifestyle”, an evaluation method to assess their impact on the environment, economy and community embedded on a digital platform.
– To raise awareness, to induce debates and empower teachers and pupils with new instructional strategies that enable them to be change agents in today’s complex world.

Our final target audience is upper secondary school pupils aged 15 to 19. With this project we will address their need to study in a fully sustainable environment in order to gain knowledge across multiple disciplines, increase environmentally friendly behavior, develop skills as critical thinking and problem solving, creativity and etc.

We will also target the whole school community, school administration, teachers, parents and carers, educational NGO’s.

At the completion of the project we expect at least 150 schools using the sustainability framework for school self-assessment as a tool for evaluation.

The project reflects the horizontal priority Environmental and Climate Goals and Innovative Practices in a Digital Era.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 164715 Eur

Project Coordinator

LIETUVOS VAIKU IR JAUNIMO CENTRAS VI & Country: LT

Project Partners

• THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
• VYTAUTO DIDZIOJO UNIVERSITETAS
• EESTI PEOPLE TO PEOPLE
• UNIVERSITAET VECHTA