Leadership for Sustainability

Dr David Dixon was a full-time primary teacher for 15 years before becoming a head teacher for the following two decades. In that time, he promoted the twin causes of environmental education and sustainability, which formed the central ethos of his schools. David is now a freelance education consultant, specialising in curriculum and leadership and helping individual schools to link sustainability with school improvement more generally.

Leadership for Sustainability develops the reader's understanding of green issues and sustainability and sites them within the context of school leadership, learning, emotional intelligence, curriculum innovation and school improvement. The focus on transformational leadership and linking the local to the global, supported by grounded examples from the author's own practice and that of others, makes possible the planning and actions needed in order to implement a whole-school sustainability agenda that is more than just a tokenistic gesture. The book offers concrete ideas to develop a school culture in which the sustainability agenda is supported by, and supports, a learning culture focused on equity and inclusion.The radical changes needed to create a greener school are embedded in examples of deliberate and explicit acts of transformation that link together school staff, students, families and the community as equal partners. As David says, 'sustainability is literally life, the universe and everything' - and fortunately for school leaders he offers a clear contextual exploration of the issues and a road map that will allow each school to plan its own journey while seeing itself as part of the global challenge to save the planet one school at a time.Chris Straker