Sustainability and Science Education: Exploring Roles and Challenges (Environmental Challenges and Solutions)

This open access book examines how science education can respond meaningfully to the challenges of sustainability in a world marked by uncertainty, value conflicts, and contested knowledge. Rather than treating sustainability as an additional topic to be inserted into existing curricula, the volume explores how sustainability invites not only a deeper reconsideration of the purposes, practices, and responsibilities of science education, but also on education in a larger perspective. Across diverse educational contexts, the chapters illuminate how scientific knowledge, ethical reflection, and civic engagement intersect when learners are prepared not only to understand the world, but also to deliberate and act within it.

Addressing philosophical questions, curriculum innovation, learner perspectives, and classroom practices, the book offers critical and constructive insights into how science education can foster agency, critical judgment, and informed participation in sustainability-related decision-making. It is particularly attentive to tensions between disciplinary knowledge and interdisciplinary demands, between evidence and values, and between knowledge acquisition and action.

This volume will be of interest to researchers, teacher educators, graduate students, and advanced practitioners in science education and sustainability education, as well as policy-oriented readers concerned with the future role of education in addressing global environmental and societal challenges. It provides a rich resource for those seeking to rethink science education as an essential contributor to sustainable futures.

Dr. Frode Skarstein is an Associate Professor of Science Education at the Department of Education and Sports Science, University of Stavanger (UiS), Norway. He holds a PhD in ecology and is a certified teacher, with an academic background bridging natural sciences, science education, and sustainability education. His research focuses on how science education can support sustainability thinking, inquiry-based learning, and climate and environmental education across educational levels. He is involved in several internationally funded research projects related to STEM education and the use of digital tools in science teaching. Skarstein is also a part of the leadership team of the UiS research group Transforming Education – Towards a Sustainable Future and collaborates closely with local schools on whole-school approaches to sustainability education. He has extensive teaching experience in upper secondary education, university science courses, and science teacher education.

Dr. Lili-Ann Wolff is an Associate Professor of Environmental Education at the Faculty of Educational Sciences, University of Helsinki, Finland, and a member of the Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Science (HELSUS). Wolff holds degrees in education, science, and philosophy, and her research focuses on environmental and sustainability education from several angles. In addition to experience in interdisciplinary and collaborative research approaches, she is used to collaborative international research and policy-related educational issues. She has especially contributed to European, Nordic, and Finnish expert groups on sustainability education. In 2020 – 2024, she served as a Finnish Management Committee member in the EU COST Action PHOENIX – Protection, Resilience, Rehabilitation of Damaged Environment. Since 2023 she is a member of the Finnish Nature Panel, an independent, but statutory, panel of scientific experts that supports nature and biodiversity policy planning and decision-making.