The UN Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs) are talked about a lot, and there’s a real buzz around Education for Sustainable Development , or ESD. The Higher Education Academy defines it as an interdisciplinary pedagogical approach “to contribute to an environmentally and ethically responsible society”, reflecting the origins of the concept of sustainable development in the climate change movement.

The current 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development embraces the complexity of environmental and societal issues today. None of the 17 goals are more important than the others and none exist in isolation, yet all are underpinned by universal values. These values (which I intend to explore in more detail in future posts) and goals focus action on people, the planet and prosperity.

The oncology and palliative care educational programmes that I lead take the “people” perspective of the UNSDGs. After 10 years and 2 major change procedures, I can confidently say that my knowledge of our programme curriculum was better than my understanding of the UNSGDs, but I was determined to get a handle on this thing they called ESD. Did it even apply to my courses and if so, what did it mean?

I began by mapping our curriculum against each goal and its associated targets, using Trello. I noted learning activities and outcomes which matched each goal and identified gaps and potential opportunities. Not unexpectedly, Goal 3: Good Health and Wellbeing predominates our programme and here are some examples:

• Target 3.4 to reduce premature mortality from NCDs is one of our key aims, through education on cancer screening, early detection and treatment. I didn’t, however, appreciate that this target also includes the promotion of mental health and well-being, which is covered in our module “Psychosocial Issues in Advanced Disease“.

• Target 3.8 on Universal Health Coverage is very important to us, as we have the honour of having many students join us from developing countries and it features heavily in several of our modules.

• Target 3.9b on research and development of drugs for the management of cancer is core research at Newcastle University and compulsory on our oncology for the pharmaceutical industry programme, modules which also relate to Goal 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure.

This wasn’t an exercise in ticking boxes or joining dots. The UNSDGs have allowed me to reframe our programme and consider, from different perspectives, what and how we teach. For instance, it was evident that our educational offerings failed to consider the need for clean water and sanitation in the care of people with cancer and advanced disease (Goal 6) and did not explicitly include the impact of harmful gender practices on the management of female cancers (Goal 5, target 3). Thanks to the UNSD framework I have a message to take to colleagues working in these fields for future collaborations

I love the UNSDGs and wear its pin enthusiastically now. I love the clarity they give to complexity and their inherently collaborative intent, enabling us to work on different enterprises with shared intent. I love how they just make sense, a commodity not always in great supply, and how they provoke us to challenge assumptions and see the world differently. I love these 17 goals and, after reading this post, I hope you will too.