The aim of this round table session is to discuss the relationship between theory and practice in environmental and sustainability education (ESE). Three contributions from Sweden, Belgium and Denmark provide different perspectives on this question and a basis for discussions among the session participants. A common element in all contributions is that they challenge the notion of practitioners as passive receivers of theoretical knowledge. The first contribution reports on a research project that aims to contribute to the understanding of how practitioners understand and engage with theoretical research results. The other two contributions present and discuss concrete examples of collaboration between researchers and practitioners.

First, Johanna Lönngren presents a case study in which engineering educators, who are active in the field of ESE, engage in individual discussions with the researcher about concrete conceptual and empirical research results and the value of such results for the educators’ own practices. The case study aims to answer the following questions: 1. What are some possible practical applications of the research results?, 2. In what ways could the results be further elaborated in order to be valuable for practitioners?, and 3. What are some relevant characteristics of the practitioners’ educational contexts that influence the practitioners’ abilities to utilize the research results for improving their educational practices? By answering these questions, the study aims to contribute to a wider discourse about what may be effective ways of communicating and collaborating between researchers and practitioners in ESD.

Second, the study of Katrien van Poeck et al. reports on a university project at the Belgian “Laboratory for Education and Society” (L.E.S.) that attempts to integrate the dimensions of research, learning and public impact (Simons & Masschelein, 2009). This initiative involves ESE practitioners in “collective experimentation” in the context of a university course at bachelor level and, doing so, moves beyond a focus on bridging the gap between theory and practice by rendering educational theories “accessible” and “usable” to practitioners. By proposing a collaboration through collective experimentation, ESE practitioners are invited to enter the university and are offered time/space to engage in collective and public study. The aim is to form a collective of regular students, teachers and practitioners in front of the issue of ESE, and hence, to turn ESE into an issue of collective concern. In the context of this contribution, the preparation and set-up of the collective experiment is described in detail (experimental design, collective protocol, organization of the collective work, etc.), which provides a basis for reflections on the possible role of universities in dealing through education and research with issues of public concern.

Finally, Jeppe Læssøe introduces a framework for understanding the role of ESE researchers as interactive mediators between theory and practice. The contribution aims to break the dichotomy between common views of researchers as “traditional experts” versus “purely facilitating action researchers”. Based on an example from research on local participation in the context of sustainability initiatives in Denmark, Jeppe Læssøe also provides concrete suggestions for how ESE researchers could work in the intersection between theory and practice.

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