Enviromental leadership in action: the Green Education Lab

The most recent programmatic indications (for example, the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development or the recent Next Generation Europe) demonstrate how widespread environmental awareness among younger generations is a necessary condition for successfully navigating the ecological transition. Universities, in particular, are being challenged to take a more difficult step toward sustainability and a green culture in order to educate the next generation of citizens, policymakers, and educators. Promoting environmental education at universities requires interacting with individuals and responding to specific requests from local and global communities. This implies that universities see themselves as civic institutions accountable to the communities to which they belong. In this direction, to better equip educators with a systemic perspective and a knowledge of the transdisciplinary dimensions of environmental issues, educational proposals must be more responsive to the changing needs of a changing society. The paper describes a specific intervention developed as part of the PON Research and Innovation Project - REACT EU - (GREEN) "Environmental leadership in education. Educational design, sustainability culture, ethical and social responsibility". The research project, which is currently underway at the Department of Education Sciences (University of Catania), involved the establishment of the “Green Education LAB" (GEL) with the goal of conducting research and providing training initiatives on transition and ecological issues, sustainable development and environmental education. The aim of GEL is to enhance understanding of sustainable development in formal, non-formal and informal education through its work with schools. The epistemological and methodological foundations of the GEL are discussed in this paper. Environmental education is learner-centered, allowing future educators and teachers to develop their own understandings through hands-on investigations. Indeed, the complexity and multidimensionality of environmental challenges cannot be addressed solely through a lecture-based approach, but rather through multi-actor involvement, action-based learning, and an interdisciplinary approach