A Participatory Curriculum Approach to ICT-Enabled Education for Sustainability in Higher Education

Abstract

This paper explores the ways in which a participatory curriculum planning model could help to address the embedding of an education on sustainability into higher education institutions; this is enabled by ICTs and is in particular reference to Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam. Transforming university curricula in order to address sustainability has been tackled effectively through the development of a participatory curriculum planning model that was applied in seven higher education institutions. The interventions carried out by the ICTeEfS initiative have contributed significantly to producing a corpus of university teaching staff in each partner university which, in turn, has initiated curriculum revisions to address sustainability, mostly in teacher education.

1. Introduction

Education systems, at all levels and especially in higher education, bear their own responsibility for the sustainability crisis that the world is nowadays facing. Some critics of higher education have argued that it has produced all sorts of graduates that have led the world towards this crisis [1,2,3]. At the same time, higher education could and should play a unique and critical role in making a healthy, fair, climate-neutral, and sustainable society [4,5]. Sustainability challenges the current paradigms, structures, as well as predominant practices in higher education [5,6,7]. However, simply educating citizens to a higher level does not necessarily lead to higher levels of sustainable ways of knowing, thinking, acting, and living. Higher education is currently facing one of its greatest intellectual, ethical, and political challenge; it must provide the knowledge, skills, values, and action competences to its graduates that allow them to cope with the huge environmental, social, and economic challenges locally and globally [8,9]. This seems to be one of the greatest intellectual, ethical, and political challenges that higher education is facing [10]. This may be due to the fact that sustainability in higher education lacks interdisciplinary curricula that reflect the real needs elicited by multiple stakeholders. Within the higher education sector, there have been various landmarks regarding the design of interdisciplinary approaches and mechanisms to infuse sustainability into teaching, learning, and the curricula [11,12,13]. However, current practices in higher education curriculum development take place within a framework of limited stakeholder consultation [14,15].

Although interdisciplinary teaching and learning are highly prioritised in higher education institutions, in practice, there is a lack of interdisciplinary perspective and motivation among teaching staff [2]. Interdisciplinary collaboration is essential for modernizing higher education and it is a necessary condition for any transformation to meet the challenges of the sustainability crisis in the region. In addition, the relative detachment of higher education institutions from the labour market needs and of stakeholder participation from course design and content places sustainable development courses in a marginal position. Thus, a multi-stakeholder-driven model for modernising higher education curricula is needed, taking into consideration the evidence that the current efforts aimed at developing the curricula take place with limited or no stakeholder participation [16,17]. In general, participation implies the active involvement of stakeholders in decisions concerning the curriculum development process. It is a fundamental right through which active citizenship is promoted and that ensures what is being taught in higher education can better reflect societal needs. Alexander and Hjortsø [14] (p. 301) argue that those “who seek to design and implement effective participatory curriculum development processes can benefit from applying a combination of activity system and stakeholder analyses during planning as well as implementation stages”. This is especially critical in developing transnational higher education partnership models for curriculum development [18], such as in our ICTeEfS project in the South East Asian region. Identifying who the stakeholders are, the reasons for their involvement, the type of knowledge that will be elicited, and how it can be explored to assist the development of the higher education curriculum toward sustainability is of critical importance.

The challenges posed by the sustainability crisis in higher education require paradigm shifts in what is taught, why it is taught and how it is taught. Above all, there is a need to educate individuals who are able to bridge the isolated academic fields in order to develop sustainable alternatives that are ecologically sound and socially equitable. There is, thus, a critical need for universities to cope with the sustainability crisis. Beyond multi-stakeholder participation in curriculum development, it also demands teaching staff who have the necessary readiness to transform university curricula towards sustainability through effective capacity-building interventions.

1.1. Capacity Building in the Field of Higher Education

Providing capacity-building training for university teaching staff in order to ensure that they are ready to reorient university curricula to address sustainability and embed interdisciplinary approaches to curriculum development is of paramount importance [2,3]. Chapter 37 of the UN Agenda 21 for sustainable development makes clear the nature and importance of capacity building. Without the necessary capacity building, higher education institutions will be unable to meet the challenges posed by sustainable development. Capacity building has been approached “as a long-term continual process of development that involves all stakeholders; including ministries, local authorities, non-governmental organizations, professionals, community members, academics and more” [19] (p. 10). It has been also understood from a systems perspective that primarily addresses three key levels of capacity: (1) individual capacity; (2) institutional capacity and (3) societal capacity [20]. According to UNDP, the individual level, the first layer of capacity building, refers to the process of finding ways to support stakeholders to meet their individual needs for new knowledge and skills in a specified area using multiple resources. At the institutional level, the second layer of the capacity building focuses on existing institutions that can be used to support building organizational structures, managerial competence, and a capacity for coping with changing demands. Capacity building at the societal level, the third layer of capacity building, mostly refers to enabling public and private entities, as well as communities, to develop skills and competencies so that they can contribute to the building of more sustainable futures.

Capacity building has also been defined in the context of evaluation studies, seeking to enhance stakeholders’ understanding of evaluation concepts and practices, and simultaneously creating appropriate evaluation cultures [21]. Vega [22] focuses on a change in the planning capacity building stressing customisation, holism, network building, grass-rooting, and evaluation, in an attempt to enhance the skills of the teaching staff through tailored curricula in six community areas. Takashi and Keisuke [23] target interdisciplinary resonance in environmental leadership capacity building by providing an integrated, multidisciplinary curriculum; they also build educational and research opportunities that promote a mutual understanding among individuals in environmental fields. Similarly, Adransen et al. [24] take a cross-disciplinary approach to understanding the capacity building of the university sector through the lens of climate research. They analyse how scientific knowledge is negotiated and contested in parallel to societal changes in general and capacity building in particular, and thus analyse how scientific knowledge becomes local. Similarly, Stavrou [25] presents how a participatory curriculum change has been negotiated and implemented in the French higher education system.

1.2. The ICTeEfS Participatory Curriculum Development Approach

Higher education has been recognised as a critical sector for capacity building [26]. The European Commission has initiated an action within the ERASMUS plus programme, focusing on collaborative capacity-building projects in the field of higher education, including countries from certain regions of the world, besides EU member states. In this context, capacity-building projects can be jointly developed to help higher education institutions to develop, modernise and disseminate new curricula, teaching methods, or materials, as well as to boost quality assurance and good governance. There is also a focus on structural projects that aim to develop and reform higher education institutions and systems in partner countries; this is in order to enhance their quality and relevance, promote regional cooperation, and increase convergence. In this context, the European Commission Erasmus+ programme, currently named “Capacity building in the field of higher education”, has approved the finance of the ICTeEfS project for the 2019–2023 period.

Seeking to enhance the capacity-building interventions for embedding sustainability into higher education curricula, and in an effort to create a model that could help in planning and applying such interventions effectively, a participatory curriculum planning model was conceptualised in this study. To do so, we have been drawing our resources from the fields of sustainable development, transformative learning, change, and critical adult learning and pedagogy. Developing a participatory curriculum is a multi-stakeholder-driven and field-based practice, and is not based on a small group of experts performing desk work. Involving a wide range of stakeholders in a meaningful way in order to identify the needs of the curricula in terms of training, setting aims and learning objectives, and so that they can contribute to the development of the subject matter to be taught, is considered a critical factor in designing participatory and negotiated curricula. The ICTeEfS participatory curriculum development was perceived as a process, context, and praxis. As a process, reorienting university curricula to address sustainability is not an end in itself, but rather a process that focuses on the interaction of teaching staff, students, and other relevant stakeholders. As context, the curriculum is contextualised in ways that reflect the local/regional environment. The notion of reorienting a university curriculum as a praxis means that sustainability practice should be oriented towards transformation, both at the personal and societal level through critical reflection.

Based on these notions, a participatory curriculum planning model for the ICTeEfS initiative in the field of higher education was developed, and consists of five interactive processes (Figure 1). In the following, we will present how this model works, drawing on our experiences in designing, developing, and implementing this project in the South East Asia region.

2. Material and Methods: Integrating Participatory Action Research

In this study, a participatory action research (PAR) approach was used to examine the process of deconstructing university courses from multiple disciplines to incorporate the principles of sustainability and SDGs. The participants included academic teachers in seven universities in the South East Asian countries of Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam. Data were collected across two academic (2020–2022) years through documents, questionnaires, interviews, and focus groups, and were analysed quantitatively and qualitatively. In this paper, we do not focus on the results of the study as such, but instead, we are using some of the results and their interpretations to explore the ICTeEfS participatory curriculum planning model.

More specifically, in the ICTeEfS project, there was an attempt to bridge the quantitative–qualitative divide through a mixed-method approach based on a sequential transformative design; this was organised in three phases [27]. First, a SWOT analysis was designed and carried out, which led to the advancement of an ESD student competence framework. The SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) carried out in the three partner countries involved the local Regional Centres of Expertise on Education for Sustainable Development of RCE Yogyakarta (Indonesia), RCE Penang (Malaysia), and RCE Southern Vietnam. The data collection methodology for the SWOT analysis included personal interviews, workshops, focus groups, public meetings, surveys, participatory tools, and stakeholder panels.

Second, on the basis of this framework, a survey was designed and carried out in the partner universities with the participation of 1497 students across the seven higher education institutions in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam. The aim of the survey was to identify, among other things, the knowledge students acquire from their courses in relation to sustainable development, the sources of sustainability knowledge, the teaching methods, the attitudes toward learning to live sustainably, sustainability actions, and the perceived functions and roles of universities. Among the 1497 undergraduate students, 60% came from their 1st year of study, and the remaining 40% were from their last year. In terms of subjects, 87% were studying subjects related to the field of education and the remaining 13% studied sciences. In terms of gender, 65% were females, reflecting the student majority in the field of education. The students’ knowledge of ICTs ranged from sufficient to excellent, with 83% declaring that they had excellent knowledge, only 2% declaring that they had poor knowledge and 15% declaring that they had minimal knowledge. A similar trend was found in terms of their knowledge-related education of sustainability and their knowledge in terms of merging ICT with education for sustainable development.

Third, a questionnaire was developed for ICT teacher coordinators in the partner countries’ universities; this aimed to gather data on key concepts related to capacity building, and other data that are useful in developing training interventions and course curriculum revision. The number of ICT teacher coordinators reached up to 1815, of whom the majority (No = 1253 or 69%) came from the three partner institutions in Malaysia, followed by the two institutions in Indonesia (No = 360 or 20%) and the two institutions in Vietnam (202 or 11%). These proportions also reflect the educational policy in the partner countries regarding the function of ICT teacher coordinators. In terms of gender, 40% were males and 60% were females. In total, 39% of the ICT teacher coordinators were currently working, 10% had worked in the past as ICT coordinators, and 51% of the participants identified themselves as ICT-experienced teachers. The majority (56%) were working in primary school education, and most of the teachers who responded to the survey had graduated from teacher education institutions (76%); meanwhile, 9% had graduated from Computer Sciences, 12% from applied sciences, and 3% from other academic fields. In terms of geographical distribution, 43% of the teachers surveyed worked in urban areas, 30% in rural areas, and 27% in semi-urban areas. In total, 40% of them had teaching experience of 15 years or more, followed by 28% between 10–14, 20% between 5–9, and 12% under 4 years. Their knowledge of an education in sustainability was lower than average, while the majority expressed a sufficient knowledge of ICTs.

On the basis of the SWOT analysis and discussions within the project staff, the needs and knowledge assessments were summarised, identifying the stakeholders’ needs, the barriers, and drivers critical to their successful engagement with the process of the design and development of the ICTeEfS teaching standards and competences. The results of the follow-up surveys targeted both students and teachers, and were also used for developing the strategy and the capacity-building programme for revising university curricula to address sustainability. All of these were instrumental in developing the ICTeEfS teaching standards and competencies framework. A competency framework defines the knowledge, skills, and attributes needed for any target group within a certain environment and for varied purposes. The ICTeEfS framework was structured on a template that included standards, competencies, performance indicators, and resources. Standards, in general, are related to learning outcomes, curriculum, instruction, and assessment in an organised and meaningful manner. They provide a map of where to go in terms of capacity building to tailor instruction to the learners’ needs. Thus, standards are not simply a list of important knowledge sets, skills, values, and action competences. In this sense, the competences covered in the standards and their performance indicators were perceived as an integral part of pre-service education and in-service capacity building. In the ICTeEfS context, competence was the term used to describe a cluster of related knowledge, skills, and attributes; this was an extension of discrete statements organised along the key areas. Performance indicators for competencies are more visible and measurable for expressing on-the-job behaviours. More specifically, the ICTeEfS teaching standards and competences framework was used as a guide for the following:

• Conceptualizing capacity-building programs for teacher educators, faculty staff, and in-service teachers.
• Training teacher educators and other involved staff to deconstruct, construct and reconstruct their courses to address the contextualization of ICT in EfS and vice versa.
• Designing certified professional development courses and interventions for in-service teachers in the field of ICTeEfS.

3. Results

3.1. Strengthening Stakeholders’ Inputs

The ICTeEfS initiative is driven by a multi-stakeholder approach to embedding sustainable development into various courses and disciplines. First, there was a need for identifying all the potential stakeholders and devising appropriate strategies for their participation in the curriculum development process. Second, all the stakeholders got involved in identifying the compatibilities and conflicts of interest related to reorienting university curricula in order to address sustainability. The focus was placed on internal (e.g., academic staff, teachers, students, administrators) and external stakeholders (e.g., decision-makers, community members, experts, and educational administrators).

For monitoring and quality assurance, for each partner university in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam, a small design team consisting of members from each academic discipline involved was set up to (a) create a road map for the ICTeEfS programme, (b) engage and involve stakeholders in the curriculum design, and (c) work with individual faculties and the university administration. In order to strengthen the stakeholders’ inputs, in each partner university an institutional design team was assigned to lead working groups (WG). The WGs were charged with (i) mapping partner university courses that could be reviewed and modified appropriately for the programme, (ii) brainstorming ideas for courses and content, and (iii) developing the pedagogical and structural principles that would guide the development of the course curriculum revision process. Coordination among all the design teams and WGs was essential in order to ensure the appropriate and timely preparation of all the assigned works. Thus, an inter-university design team was established, which included key experts from the E.U. and partner universities.

3.2. Applying Curriculum to Community-Based Practice

Contextual learning or more meaningful learning for university students can be enhanced by merging knowledge with action [28,29]. It was planned that the revised courses infused with sustainability issues would largely be elicited from SDGs and be connected to the local community. Community-based learning has been promoted as a way to develop stronger relationships between the school and its surrounding community. For example, more than 3000 teachers were involved in the in-service capacity-building interventions and have developed close to 1800 participatory videos that focus on real-life local problems, largely derived from the 17 SDGs. This connection provided opportunities for teachers to involve students and community members, promoting in this way a kind of intergenerational learning and engaged citizenship. Over the duration of the ICTeEfS project, students and teachers applied what they were studying in the revised course curriculum to analyse local real-life problems, reflect on what they were learning, and provide potential solutions. In this way, the community provided a context in which academic staff, teachers, students, parents, and community members encountered real-life problems that reflected environmental, social, economic, and cultural issues.

3.3. Continuing Curriculum Revision through Participation

Our concept for the design of the curriculum focused on considering curricula as a process and a set of living documents that go beyond the prescriptive knowledge that is usually decided upon top-down [30]. The emphasis was placed on engaging a number of stakeholders at different levels in the process, taking into consideration the complex socioeconomic, political, and cultural contexts. Consequently, we adopted a participatory or negotiated curriculum approach that complies with the identified need to “give voice” to those often excluded (e.g., students, teachers, and community) from the curriculum development process. A key component of the ICTeEfS participatory or negotiated curriculum approach was the recognition that, in this process, it is critical to make the existing power relationships inside and outside the educational institutions explicit. Using participatory and negotiation techniques entails inviting internal (e.g., teaching staff, students, and administrators) and external (e.g., professionals, industry, services, government, civic societies) stakeholders to contribute to and change the curriculum. This process was highly facilitated through training workshops implemented in each of the three countries, along with regional training workshops. More than 70 university teaching staff were trained, supported by an online community of practice used for continuous capacity building. In these workshops, particular emphasis was given to the participatory and negotiated curriculum development approaches; these were the six pillars of learning (learning to know, learning to be, learning to do, learning to live together sustainably, learning to transform oneself and society, and learning to give/share), interdisciplinary skills, as well as the 10Cs of transversal skills needed for 21^st century education [13,27,31].

Each partner university revised 9–11 courses infused with sustainability issues; these were largely drawn from the SDGs and the local societies using the DeCoRe+ curriculum development methodology [32]. The sustainability themes infused in the revised course curricula represented a diverse range of academic subjects and disciplines, and the key strategic themes included climate change, energy use and management, sustainable urbanization, natural resources (water security, deforestation, sustainable agriculture, biodiversity), child labour, sustainable tourism, fair trade, social justice, indigenous knowledge, and sustainable production/consumption.

The revision process was strengthened through the inputs of students, community members, key experts, and representatives from the three regional centres of expertise on education in sustainable development, namely, RCE Penang, RCE Southern Vietnam and RCE Yogyakarta. Two external evaluators were also assigned to assess the revised courses; on the basis of their feedback, further revisions were carried out.

3.4. Institutionalising Negotiated Curriculum

The building of a supportive infrastructure and a mechanism by which different stakeholders can work together is of critical importance in a capacity-building process. Considering this, in each partner institution, an ICT Lab and a Learning Management System, supported by an Online Community of Practice (OnCoP), were developed. The revised courses were accredited by the internal quality assurance bodies. In the process of institutionalisation, efforts were placed on strengthening the capacity of partner institutions in order to provide opportunities that offer continuing support to local teachers on ICTeEfS-related issues; this included developing lesson plans that were enabled by ICTS, strategies for infusing SDGs in lesson planning, and developing further in-house training through peer coaching and mobile mentorships. Besides encouraging the institutionalisation of broad-based participation, including monitoring and quality assurance mechanisms, educational decision-making, and management bodies at the local level, the ICTeEfS coordinating body has promoted policy dialogue among institutional coordinators, working groups teams, and other representatives of local society; this is in order to improve the planning and institutionalisation of the proposed curricula in terms of the long-term sustainability of the project. Enabling the partners and associated local authorities to take initiatives at local, national, and regional levels and, in particular, to share the good practices and innovative approaches of the ICTeEfS, was seen as a strategy that would further contribute to the institutionalisation and long-term sustainability of the project’s outcomes. All these processes and practices have allowed the attempted transformative actions and the revision of the course content and instructional methodologies to address sustainability across the seven partner universities in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam.

4. Discussion

In preparing teacher educators and other university teaching staff for embedding sustainability in higher education curricula, we were usually faced with at least three crucial decisions: (1) what to teach and how to teach it, (2) how to revise, design, and implement a course, and (3) how to ensure that students are learning what they were expected to learn. In this paper, participatory curriculum development is seen as an emerging approach that builds on the experiences of key stakeholders’ participation. It is also perceived as a means of reorienting university curricula to address sustainability [33]. The development of the ICTeEfS participatory curriculum has been also envisioned as a powerful force for change through interdisciplinary teaching, learning, and curricula, enabled by the use of learning technologies and innovative pedagogies. In particular, this paper examined an important component of embedding sustainability in higher education curricula through the advancement of a participatory curriculum planning model, enabled by face-to-face and online capacity-building interventions. Through this process, we have learned that reorienting university curricula to address sustainability through a participatory curriculum development approach can be a real challenge in practice. It also demands a transparent, inclusive, and participatory planning approach in order to build those capacities that would ensure that participants are ready to adopt such curriculum approaches.

The ICTeEfS participatory curriculum planning model for embedding sustainability into higher education has proved to be an effective means to achieve its expected outcomes. This model was driven by viewing curriculum as a process and praxis, and a means to balance environmental, social, economic, and cultural perspectives, and was contextualised through linking the local, the national, and the global. In addition, it was a multi-stakeholder-driven process, and engaged students, instructors, administrators, and the community and public sectors; it was also multi-methodological, using a variety of pedagogical methods and transversal skills to promote active and participatory learning. It has also emphasised sustainability justice, reflecting environmental, social, economic, and cultural justice, and has focused on promoting active local/global citizenship. Based on the needs and knowledge assessments, and the results of the stakeholders’ surveys involving 1497 students and 1815 teachers, the ICTeEfS teaching standards and competencies framework was developed, which guided subsequent training and course curriculum revisions. Academic staff, teacher educators, students, and in-service teachers should build certain competences; these are measured by concrete indicators, driven by standards, and supported by suitable resources. A number of standards were identified, which, in turn, were divided into competencies; for each competence, a number of performance indicators were formulated. In this context, a generic framework of macro, meso, and micro curriculum levels for undergraduate students and academic teachers was developed to facilitate students’ learning. At the micro-level, academic teachers facilitated the learning process, i.e., by coaching and mentoring, while at the meso-level, they attained more advanced roles as coordinators; this could help them to move towards leadership roles at the macro level.

This project contextualised sustainability by taking into consideration local problems and issues, organizing symbolic rewards for the most committed (e.g., certification, champion awards), identifying barriers and drivers, and providing required materials and resources in a timely manner; these factors were found to be highly critical strategic decisions in the process of institutionalising the tangible outcomes. The contribution of multiple stakeholders not only helps in creating courses and curricula that are suitable for societal needs, but also in giving them the appropriate status for their accreditation and institutionalisation in each partner country institution. However, having students, teachers, and community members work on an authentic real-life problem is not without its challenges. The key challenges encountered were workload, a lack of proper teaching methods, collaboration, COVID-19, the timeframe, and recognition. The trained teachers declared that they experienced a high workload duty that provided initial resistance; however, this was tackled appropriately for the smooth implementation of the project. Measures were taken to properly allocate resource and balance tasks, deadlines, and skills. Another challenge was to schedule the face-to-face training of the in-service teachers, since scheduling adhered to the conditions stipulated by the local educational authorities. Additionally, this was highly evident during the COVID-19 period. Blended learning and online training were applied across all our training interventions. It has been also evidenced that it was difficult to complete some project assignments, such as making a participatory video, within the timeframe of the training intervention, mostly due to time pressures. Being flexible and investing in explaining and convincing local and central educational officials was found to be very critical.

Working on real-life problems was found to be challenging since the rigid academic units and disciplinary structures raised concerns. This was tackled by training interventions that focused on inter/cross-disciplinary learning. Reorienting the university curriculum to address sustainability enabled by ICTs was often associated with cumbersome and lengthy approval processes. Fortunately, the undergraduate courses to be revised did not require such a lengthy approval process. However, in some cases, there were restrictions in regard to the depth of the changes. Stricter requirements in core disciplines that did not allow for substantial changes in the curriculum were avoided by including optional courses, as well as courses offered to all students regardless of academic discipline. This has also provided an advantage to the ICTeEfS project in terms of reaching a higher target student audience. An even more challenging hurdle was the lack of an institutionalised incentive system for rewarding academic staff and in-service teachers for implementing changes in teaching, learning, and the curriculum. This caused problems for university teaching staff in their efforts to reconstruct their courses and shift from monodisciplinary to interdisciplinary, cross-disciplinary, and transdisciplinary pursuits. It was also decided that student-driven learning activities that addressed sustainability issues and SDGs would be focused on so that instructors had more flexibility in embedding these aspects in the courses. The challenge for course instructors offering new and innovative teaching, learning, and curriculum reconstruction opportunities was tackled by continuous support and guidance from the key leading experts from the European partner institutions. Similarly, engaging students and teachers in a reflective process was also a challenge due to a lack of knowledge and perhaps unsuitable cultural habits for innovative teaching methods.

Our partners in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam did not have adequate training opportunities to introduce and empower their faculty members with innovative pedagogical methods and teaching tools to address the challenge of infusing SDGs in teaching, learning, and curricula enabled by ICTs. The ICTeEfS project provided them with training and new methods of promoting student and teacher engagement; this also involved appreciating inter/cross-disciplinary learning, participatory curriculum development, and collaborative teaching (peer coaching and mobile mentoring) in delivering sustainability justice and SDG-related teaching and learning. Faculty members needed resources, motivation, innovative pedagogies, and retraining opportunities to implement the ICTeEfS project activities, especially to engage and work with and beyond the academic walls. Such processes are time-consuming and require faculty members and in-service teachers to work extra to their workload and, more importantly, outside the box. Shifting from their traditional comfort zones and habits was really a challenge for those involved in the ICTeEfS project. Incentives were proven to act as motivation to encourage teachers to be active during the training process. Another lesson learned is that different educational ecosystems require customised approaches to education for sustainability enabled by ICTs. There was also a need to rethink, reflect and create inspiring collaborative interventions in teaching, learning, and the curriculum, in order to embed sustainability and SDG in multiple academic disciplines. Despite the challenges faced, there are always opportunities to move forward toward building a more sustainable and fair society.

5. Conclusions

In this article, we presented a participatory curriculum approach to ICT-enabled education for sustainability that was applied in seven South East Asian universities in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam. Data were collected from academic teachers and in-service teachers across two academic (2020–2022) years through documents, questionnaires, interviews, and focus groups; there were analysed quantitatively and qualitatively. This type of action research approach seemed to suit our project, as its ultimate purpose was not only to empower academic teachers to revise curricula to address SDGs and in-service teachers to infuse SDGs in school curricula through developing participatory videos, but also to see their role through the lens of learning to transform themselves and society. As pointed out earlier, in this article, we did not focus on the results of the study as such, but instead, we are limited to the results and the interpretations that help to explore the development and use of the ICTeEfS participatory curriculum planning model. Our participatory curriculum approach to ICT-enabled education for sustainability attempted to address two major objectives in undergraduate education: firstly, to enable academic teachers to experience their role as curriculum innovators through a process of curriculum deconstruction, construction, and reconstruction, and secondly, to facilitate the process of transferring knowledge and skills in teaching and learning practices. Overall, the ICTeEfS participatory curriculum development model has meaningfully guided us in developing capacity-building interventions, curriculum revisions, and in-service teacher training, enabled through learning technologies that address a wide array of local real-life and SDGs issues.