The International Trends in Eco-School Related Initiatives for a Sustainable Society

지속가능한 사회를 위한 생태 학교 관련 사업의 국제적 동향

Since 1985, the Ministry of Environment have supported environment conservation model schools (ECMS) to promote more structured and effective environmental education in schools. For driving ECMS to playa central role for sustainable schools in the community in Korea, international trends in foreign environmental education model schools need to be analysed in addition to overall evaluations of the present status. Eco-school related initiatives as whole-school approaches in other countries include Eco-Schools, Green School, Enviro School, and Sustainable School, etc. and most of them are usually involved in international network such as ENSI(Environment and School Initiatives) and FEE(Foundation for Environmental Education). This study was based on the literature analysis, which included available documents and reports of other countries from country reports, web-pages or official documents. Also, face-to-face or email interviews with personnels responsible for running such initiatives in a couple of countries were conducted. Implications for operating and supporting ECMS were provided based on the analysis and investigation on eco-school related initiatives of other countries, which included the main objective of initiatives, overall program direction, supporting methods, criteria for selection or accreditation, evaluation and monitoring.