Themed Issue on Hope and Agency in Sustainability Education
Journal for Sustainability Education (JSE)
Deadline: April 17, 2015

The Journal for Sustainability Education invites papers for a themed issue on Hope and Agency. As sustainability advocates and educators, we often hear that we must be careful not to share too much distressing information with our students, fellow community members, and colleagues because we risk sending them into a passive, shut-down mode, thereby suppressing the very engagement needed to move us toward more sustainable living. But what do we really know about generating and maintaining sustainability-oriented agency among our students, colleagues, friends, and community members — and how do we know it?

We seek scholarship that addresses a wide variety of questions on generating and maintaining hope and agency in sustainability education: how do we catalyze hope and agency rather than fear or despair? How can we cultivate resilience in learners for the long haul? What are developmentally appropriate frameworks for generating hope and agency in sustainability education? How might classroom-based action and engagement offer models for ongoing agency? How might educators inspire hope that is not based in deferral of current responsibility/action?

The editors of this special issue ask these questions in an effort to stimulate research, reflection, theory development, and discussion of praxis. We encourage contributors to design and conduct studies that probe questions of hope and agency in sustainability education. We also seek relevant book and media reviews, editorial pieces, photo essays, multimedia journals, case studies, and reflections on learning and practice.

Submission deadline: April 17, 2015
Expected publication date: November, 2015.
If you are interested in submitting work for this issue, please visit the JSE website, and register as an author using the RATS (review and article tracking and submission) system (follow the link to RATS at the top of the JSE home page). RATS also includes links to the JSE submission guidelines (select “submit” from the RATS interface).