Education for Sustainable Development in Kyrgyzstan Schools: Teachers’ Voices

One of the key enablers of the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is education for sustainable development, an important pillar of the fourth Agenda–Quality Education. It calls for education institutions at all levels to integrate sustainable development concepts, including knowledge, skills, and attitudes. A number of strategies related thereto have been designed, piloted, recommended, and downloaded for implementation in schools. Nonetheless, there remains little information regarding the perspectives of the teachers who are the main implementer of education for sustainable development in the classroom, including their enactment related thereto. This chapter presents a qualitative descriptive study that attempted to explore Kyrgyz teachers’ voices about education for sustainable development, their knowledge of and ideas about education for sustainable development, their perceived association of education with sustainable development, as well as their enactment of education for sustainable development in the classroom. A reflection on the findings vis-à-vis the government’s existing strategies and literature is provided. The authors think that if the goal is to boost further the implementation of education for sustainable development in the schools, specifically in the classrooms, listening and giving due consideration to teachers’ voices on the matter is imperative, considering their years of practical and context-specific experiences.