Global citizen education and the SDG challenge!

Bilingual secondary schools in the Netherland must cope with the standards from the European Platform and the ministry of education regarding European and International Orientation (Global citizenship). Teachers and pupils also feel the need to acquire the intercultural competencies based on a global mindset. The sustainable development goals help us to get theory into practice!

How can we develop and execute a hands-on practical platform for SDG outdoor education?

This year’s Global Perspectives lessons in year 4 of this bi-lingual high-school, are all about the Sustainable Development Goals and how to deal with them. The Global Perspectives (GP) curriculum not only aims at academic skills training (e.g. problem solving) within a classroom setting but also the application of what has been practiced at school apply in a local real-world setting, the SDG challenge.

In this SDG challenge, Porta Mosana’s pupils work together in teams of 6, divided into 3 pairs. Each pair chooses one SDG from a different SDG pillar. These pairs of pupils follow the following steps to fulfil their team goal:

1. Find and describe the problem: After selecting three different SDG’s, the team finds an overlapping topic of the three SDG’s on a local level. Use a Venn diagram to make this possible. So, each team needs to find and research an actual SDG related problem in Maastricht outside the classroom.
2. Action: Research an already existing solution of your local problem. Does this solution solve the problem? Collaboration with external organizations on a local level is a mandatory aspect of this practical field work research.
3. Recommendation: Each team makes an inventory of already existing local actions and makes a recommendation for improvement. The SDG wedding cake model helps to understand how they are placed in logical order to achieve the sustainable development goals.

The research and solutions will be shown via an academic poster including text, infographics, photos taken in Maastricht and a bibliography.

This year, we need PREMIUM students to help us create a sustainable local platform related to the SDG’s, based on organisations, initiatives and/or recent developments that must be used by a groups of year 4 pupils for their SDG challenge. The total group size is approx. 100 pupils. You will be involved in all stages of the SDG challenge and prepare their match with local problems. Working in classroom and/or via zoom are options to explore.
Adaptions within the programme based on news insights are part of the learning curve for all participants (pupils, students, teachers, academic advisor, local inhabitants).
The SDG challenge outdoor field research stage will take place during project days in June 2023 (5th-6th-7th)

The bilingual department of the pre-U stream (vwo) of the Porta Mosana College (PMC) is a pre-academic track for pupils between 12 and 18 years who are planning to go to university after their graduation. The bilingual department (tto) is leading in innovation within Porta Mosana College. Leading pedagogy is based on growth mindset (C.Dweck) and the Building Learning Power concept (G.Claxton) aiming at optimizing student learning outcomes. Leading education goals also focus on the development of a Global Citizen Education using the SDG’s as a learning platform. This is a set of intercultural competencies enabling young academics to adapt to the needs of a world of diversity.