re-valuing the Natural Real
Environmental Education
Environmental Education in the OPEDUCA-concept is close to the original joint complex of ecology and human life, a notion which seems to have withered away from present day Environmental Education. A development not corrected but worsened by weak interpretations of ESD, presenting social issues which may or may not be related to the environment (Kopnina, 2012). Although promoted by ESD-experts, we for example consider the installation of solar cells on a schools’ rooftop as a most dramatic example of contra-productive ESD. The academic discourse and from there policy-development which seeks to inform a practice overwhelmed by (semi-)commercial (NGO-)offerings, appears to make the dimension Earth into an afterthought, not linking environmental protection to intrinsic values of non-human species (Johannesson, Norđdahl, Oskarsdottir, Palsdottir, & Petursdottir, 2011).
Away from an overwhelming pressed upon priority
STEM
Although we acknowledge technology rests in the core of many phenomena, we do not consider it the core of education. Experiencing dozens campaigns on the local, regional and national level from nearby, STEM appeared dominatingly present in terms of advocacy, funding and time programmed in schools. A push for a STEM-agenda not per definition meeting the needs of employers and graduates, nor in the interest of students (A. Gough, 2021).
In OPEDUCA we see the consequent development of scientific thinking and reasoning, Science as (academic) field of expertise and work, science as collective term for disciplines and subjects, technology in the sense of ‘hardware’ (tools, machines), technology in the field of ‘Information and Communication’, ICT (overlapping embedded ‘hardware’ technology) and engineering as the design of technological constructs and processes.