Sejahtera Academic Framework (SAF)

46 45 FUTURES OF EDUCATION The Futures of Education as proposed by UNESCO (2020) is framed as a global initiative “to reimagine how knowledge and learning can shape the future of humanity and the planet”. Indeed, it is a bold step forward that has not been comprehensively undertaken since the days of the industrial revolutions where “education” took a drastic turn leaving behind “a world of increasing complexity, uncertainty and precarity”. To this extent, the UNESCO Director- General Audrey Azoulay was quoted as saying: "Our deeply humanist DNA cannot let us reduce education to a technical or technological issue, nor even to an economic one." Allegorically, this is in perfect sync with what the younger generation has been saying the same all along in their criticism to what is deemed as the “failure” of today’s so-called “education.” Greta Thunberg, TIME's Person of the Year for 2019, called out one such criticism in questioning where education is heading in the 21st century and beyond. She has been famously quoted to query the need to go to school when her future (and that of her generation) cannot be assured. She said: “I felt everything was meaningless and there was no point going to school if there was no future.” It, no doubt, is a powerful indictment of how education has failed to meet the “new” expectations, while some considered it as irrelevant to the post-2020 generation. More so, the post-pandemic days of COVID-19. Most significantly, she took the initiative to push back, turning it into a wave of protest and a global movement: Fridays for Future. "I promised myself I was going to do everything I could do to make a difference," she said. In fact, she was adamant that 2020 would be the year for action against climate change. An oblique way of saying the “education” has not been serious enough to engage, let alone, resolve the related issues coming on the heels of the COP25 United Nations Climate Change Conference 2019. COP25 had to be extended from Chile to Madrid despite a two-week session, giving the impression that Thunberg was on the right track, what with the less-than-optimistic outcome coming from world leaders in their deliberations. It gave rise to widespread frustration and disappointment, including that expressed by UN Secretary- General, Antonio Guterres because it lacks clarity without any clear consensus as to how best to save planet Earth, and its inhabitants. Family rights and obligations in the Islamic context are not mere private family matters that do not concern the rest of society, though their administration is assigned to the family members to handle privately. Marriage and family constitute the fundamental social institution providing the necessary natural and proper ecology for the physical, psychological, moral, spiritual and intellectual development of the human being at very crucial stages of his/her life, thus shaping their personality in a decisive manner. The most fundamental aspect of human life and existence stems from an important fact about humankind in the Qur’ān according to which God has createdman andwoman fromone and the same original human reality or entity and instilled in them a natural inclination towards each other that is the source of love, compassion, tenderness, and tranquility expressed by Qur’ānic terms as mawaddah, rahmah and sakeenah. Putting this in educational terms, the gap is clear and wide. There is much to be done in educating world leaders and policymakers on the burning issue (pun intended). Developing countries and their inhabitants, for example, are still generally unaware of the dire consequences of the climate crisis that are being shifted to them, making their future even more vulnerable when the related culprits are largely not held accountable. As long as this remains, the situation will worsen because the prevailing unjust distribution and consumption of resources between the Global North and South is unsustainable. This is further enhanced by the coronavirus outbreak that abruptly descends on the already ailing planet. We are reminded of the profound statement made by former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon: "There is no Plan B, because there is no Planet B." Meaning, the standard to be agreed upon must be equitable and just for all humanity regardless of divides – social, technical and political. The cliché to “flatten the curve” introduced to tackle the pandemic outbreak is spot-on on all fronts, education included. In other words, all nations must operate within the limits of one planet in terms of the available finite resources. Simply put, countries that have been living on a binge must now recalibrate (read re-educate) themselves into adopting a new sustainable lifestyle that is based on one planet. Decolonising education More than that, they must return the resources used in their unbridled excesses to those who have been deprived of them due to historical injustices of the past. Correcting such injustices is a vital educational outcome in achieving global sustainability post-2020 by decolonising the prevailing education ecosystem. Specifically, it must meet the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, or in short, Education 2030. Sustainable development is the organising principle for meeting human development goals while simultaneously sustaining the ability of natural systems to provide the natural resources and ecosystem services on which the economy and society depends. Unfortunately, this is a far cry from what it is today, where education is in general geared towards unsustainable production and consumption, drawing on the model of the 19th century. Generally, it resembles the factory model coming out of the very first industrial age some 300 years ago. Since then, there have been many variations over time, including the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution (IR 4.0), the latest of its kind. Fundamentally, however, the assembly-line structure based on the nexus of Manpower-Mind-Machine (Hi-tech), 3Ms, is the main stay subservient to the economic paradigm of the neo-liberal Human Capital Theory. This is now increasingly recognised to be inadequate as the ultimate solution for the future, given the confining and dehumanising nature of the 4Ms, made more fragile by the COVID-19 predicament. For example, this includes the issues of “lockdowns,” uncertainties, and shared prosperity so that no one is left behind! Succinctly, it is about contributing "to the common good of humanity”, as highlighted by UNESCO. Education for Sustainable Development