UNESCO Chair Lecture Series “De-individualising learning in transformations to sustainability”
19. Juni
Heila Lotz-Sisitka Distinguished Professor of Education and SARChI Chair: Global Change and Social Learning Systems Rhodes University, South Africa
This talk presents research on collective, learning-centred, community-based transformations and change-oriented teacher professional development programmes in southern Africa, which move beyond individualised cognitive gains as the core logic or outcome of learning. It challenges educators to embrace situated, co-engaged, and values-driven pedagogies while calling for a shift away from cognition-centred education toward one that integrates plural cultural perspectives and shared activity formation for the common good. Finally, the presentation explores how such approaches might advance decolonial paradigms of learning and commoning practices in the Anthropocene.
Heila Lotz-Sisitka holds the South African Research Chairs Initiative (SARChI) Chair in Global
Change and Social Learning Systems. Her Chair is based in the Environmental Learning Research
Centre at Rhodes University, South Africa which she directed for 18 years (2000-2015, 2022-
2025). The current focus of the Chair's research is transformative social learning and green skills
learning pathways in areas of biodiversity, the water food nexus, climate change, social and
environmental justice, and just sustainability transitions. Heila’s research interests include critical
research methodologies, transformative environmental learning, agency, and education system
transformation.
Moderator: Daniel Fischer, Professor for Sustainability Education & Communication, Leuphana University
19 June 2025, 10:30-11:30 at C40.146
Zoom: https://s.academiccloud.de/oesQL1
(registration required)
Flyer UNESCO Chair Lecture Series “De-individualising learning in transformations to sustainability”
Sustainability Education and Transdisciplinary Research Institute | UNESCO Chair in Higher Education for Sustainable Development
Leuphana Universität Lüneburg I leuphana.de/en/portals/unesco-chair.html