DEVELOPMENT OF STRATEGIES TO ENHANCE EDUCATION FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT COMPETENCE AMONG PRE-SERVICE TEACHERS AT UNIVERSITIES IN YUNNAN PROVINCE, CHINA

Abstract

Pre-service teacher’s education plays a pivotal role in shaping future educators who will impart Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) competencies to their students and foster a deeper understanding of sustainability in the classroom.Quantitative research, the first phase of this dissertation, using PLS-SEM, found that sustainable leadership had a significant positive impact on ESD holism, ESD pluralism, and ESD professional action competence. In addition, ESD holism and pluralism significantly predicted pre-service teacher’s professional action competence in ESD. Furthermore, mediation analysis revealed that ESD holism and pluralism partially mediated the impact of sustainable leadership on pre-service teacher’s professional action competence in ESD.In the qualitative research section, the qualitative data for this study were gathered through semi-structured, in-depth interviews. Participants (N=15) were purposively sampled from various stakeholders in Yunnan Province, including normal university teachers, department heads, university leaders, internship supervisors, and ESD research experts. Thematic analysis identified six core themes: (1) Holism and Systems Thinking in ESD; (2) Pluralism in ESD Pedagogy; (3) Sustainable Leadership for ESD Implementation; and (4) Components of ESD Competence which corresponded to the quantitative research constructs, and (5) ESD-Centric Curriculum Reform and (6) Continuous Professional Growth in ESD which emerged as novel factors.

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