EDUCATION FOR A GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE

Education For a Global Perspective(EGP) was created as an approach to education that would incorporate within existing curriculum a global consciousness and the knowledge, attitudes, values and skills necessary to help educators prepare our young people for effective participation in a world rapidly becoming interactive and interdependent

Do people feel and worry as I do? I'm 15 years old, and have come to a startling revelation: one day, the

world is going to end and humanity will have no one to blame but ourselves.

I don't see any future for this Earth. We have to stop killing each other, because, on the day the world

ends, it won't matter whether you're Muslim, Jewish or Catholic, black or white or Asian or gay or male or

female.

We're destroying the ozone layer ... we're cutting down the rain forests ... we're causing overpopulation

and starvation ... we cause oil spills ... nuclear disasters ... We are the ones destroying ourselves!

At my school, I hear bigotry, homophobia, racism, sexism, ignorance. hate. I hear kids shouting and

fighting, see drugs being passed around, my generation screeching "me"! or "I want this!" Everyone must

be one up from everyone else.

We can have our trendy protest groups, wear a green ribbon, yell "save the rain forest!" and

"reduce, reuse, recycle" but unless we follow through on those clichés, only then can we say we tried.

There is so much potential for this human race, and I'm scared. Am I just another pessimist or is there

any truth in my words?

Teen fears future

EGP was based on the following premises:

• Education is central to the survival of humanity as we know it

• We need a radical shift in our perception of global issues and the means through which we respond

• It is impossible to sustain a mechanistic, disconnected and reductionist conceptualization of the planet given the interdependency of the modern world

• Public education requires a new philosophical and programmatic framework to encompass the unprecedented rate of change in the modern world

• There is a need to develop and integrate global concepts on social justice, peace, human rights, development and the environment into the curriculum and activities of our schools

CONCEPTIONAL FRAMES

• Commonality and diversity

• Global Interdependence

• Biocentrism

• Self-Esteem and responsibility

• Systems Thinking

• Futures Perspective

The issues to be included when and where appropriate within

the global framework include:

• Sustainable future

• Local and global environments

• Ecology and planetary survival

• Peace, Conflict and Security

• Quality of life

• Human Rights and Responsibility

• Social Justice