Youth learning for sustainable development : analysis of experiences of online learning

Abstract: This study is a part of the research project Learning in the ICT-extended university (LiEU), which is conducted by Centre for Learning Lund at Lund University. The purpose of this study is to describe and analyse how upper secondary school students have experienced the Young Masters Program (YMP) and their learning process in the field of sustainable development in the ICT-mediated course with issues such as preventive environmental strategies within the framework of university outreach development. Through a semi-structured online evaluation questionnaire with both closed and opened questions for the student, data has been collected and an analysis has been carried out. The Young Masters Program seems to be of great importance to the students as individuals and as members of both the local and the global society. In the YMP teenagers explore a learning environment with new ICT-mediated ways of communication including global interaction with ideas and descriptions, and the transdisciplinary approach focusing social, economic, ecological and ethic dimensions. The feedback and the global meetings seem to particularly catalyse the teenagers' commitment for - and their learning process in - a more sustainable direction. Youth as stakeholders outside the university challenge the academic world and offer a unique opportunity for dialogue about the role of higher institutions in an overall societal transition towards sustainable development. To increase the understanding of how successful learning processes could be designed and carried out as outreach at the university, the YMP might serve as an educative example. Still more research is needed in this new field with this specific target group and in the area of ESD.