TITLE:
Promoting Higher Education Sustainability through Teacher Ethics Development: Government Strategies for Action in China
AUTHORS:
Guang Ma, Wanbing Shi
KEYWORDS:
Teacher Professional Ethics, Higher Education Sustainability, Government Strategies, Teacher Development, Action in China
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.12 No.1,
January
31,
2024
ABSTRACT: Higher education is imperative for the fulfillment of Education for
Sustainable Development (ESD), providing educational underpinning for effective
economic growth and environmentally friendly innovations, which is a central
pillar for enhancing global citizenship and realizing the SDGs. As the core
participants and witnesses, higher education teachers are critical forces in
the promotion of sustainable development in higher education and the
realization of ESD 2030. For this purpose, a debate on teachers and sustainable
development in higher education is essential and indispensable. Teacher
professional ethics development is the essence of teacher sustainability and an
impulsive motivation for engaging in ESD. However, limited exploration and
research is focusing on sustainable development in higher education from the
perspective of teacher ethics. Based on the Chinese context, this study selects
the research perspective of teachers’
professional ethics, and adopts theoretical elaboration, and policy analysis to
explore China’s governmental action strategies to promote Higher
Education for Sustainable Development (HESD). The study indicates that the Chinese
Government has adopted a normative, problem-oriented, and evaluation-driven
action strategy to improve the long-term mechanism for building teacher ethics.
This has accelerated the modernization of Chinese-style education and the
realization of the global SDGs.