55 Learning for Life: Integrating ESD into the Student Journey

Professor Emma O’Neill discussed how UCD is embedding ESD across the whole student journey, ensuring that all learners encounter sustainability not only in classrooms but also in co-curricular and campus life.

Professor O’Neill framed ESD as essential to achieving SDG 4: Quality Education, while also enabling progress across all other SDGs. She stressed the need for transformative learning rather than “more of the same,” equipping students to tackle complex, interdisciplinary “wicked problems” such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and global inequality. This means developing not just knowledge, but also values, agency, and the ability to collaborate across disciplines.

At UCD, the goal is that all incoming students are introduced to sustainability and given meaningful opportunities to engage. This includes sustainability-focused programmes (such as the BSc Sustainability), widely available elective modules, and the integration of ESD throughout existing curricula. Early initiatives, such as first-year orientation sessions with student polls on sustainability, begin to build awareness and encourage active participation.

Professor O’Neill emphasised the importance of using UNESCO’s eight key sustainability competencies—covering systems thinking, critical thinking, futures literacy, values, and action-oriented skills—as a shared language that transcends disciplinary boundaries. This competency-based approach is being piloted even in areas not traditionally linked to sustainability, such as veterinary medicine, demonstrating how ESD can unify diverse disciplines and strengthen graduate attributes.

UCD’s vision is to ensure that every student leaves with the skills, mindset, and confidence to act as a sustainability change-maker, both professionally and personally.

About the author

name: Professor Emma O’Neill

institution: University College Dublin