Chapter 4 Thoughts on Higher Education for Sustainable Development (HESD) amid the Pandemic
In: Pandemic, Disruption and Adjustment in Higher EducationSearch for other papers by Weimin Delcroix-Tang in
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Abstract
With the COVID-19 pandemic sweeping around the world, one much, if not the worst, affected area is higher education, indeed, education in general.
Universities either delayed or halted the spring semester in 2020, while millions of international students were stranded at home or abroad, and some higher education institutions were forced to shut down or face closure permanently. For those fortunate enough to proceed with online education, teaching quality and student learning outcomes presented a big challenge. Education, especially higher education, plays an indispensable crucial role in achieving sustainable development goals (SDG s). How then, against the backdrop of the pandemic, can higher education institutions (HEI s) strive to be the enabler of sustainable development while struggling for their own survival and development?
This chapter takes a look at the practices at the University of Sanya (USY) in China and intends to exemplify the necessary transformative shift in higher education for sustainable development (HESD) from mainly three aspects, namely, an integrated educational approach, an innovative educational and research approach, and a student-centered quality system, hoping to generate more ideas and share good practices for implementing HESD. Finally, the chapter suggests that long-term measures should be taken to meet the challenges for HESD in the unprecedented situation of having to live with the pandemic currently and in the future.