Teachers play a central role in our current process of sustainable transformation, being tasked with the ambitious goal of giving students the necessary competencies for facing and mitigating the challenges of the Anthropocene. The current study aims to contribute to the literature on this topic by investigating factors that may aid teachers in their success in this endeavor.

Following years of curricula revisions to strengthen the presence of sustainability as a theme in education, a timely question is how these revisions are followed through at the classroom level, and how this process may be aided further. The present study contributes to the understanding of how teachers’ environmental and sustainability education self-efficacy (ESESE) may be fostered. While there is an increase in studies focused on environmental and sustainability education (ESE) in teacher education, few have investigated the relative significance of teacher education in relation to other interplaying factors when it comes to ESE (Evans, et al. 2017; Ødegaard, et al. 2021). As such, the guiding research questions for this study are as follows:

1. What factors may be associated with teachers’ ESESE, and what is the role of teacher education programs when compared to other theoretically significant variables?
2. To what extent does the results from the inquiry above differ between the Nordic countries?

The study is grounded in the theory of self-efficacy, as developed by Bandura (1977). Self-efficacy is a concept of a person’s own expectation to succeed at a given task (Bandura, 1977). In meeting challenges, self-efficacy may not only aid in reducing anticipatory stress, but also in fostering efforts, and may influence the results of the undertaking of an action (Bandura, 1977, 1997; Gardner & Pierce, 1998). Within the frame of educational research, teacher self-efficacy has been found to be a key factor both in student learning and teacher instruction practices (Klassen & Tze, 2014; Tschannen-Moran & Hoy, 2001). Several factors are suggested as important for self-efficacy in the literature on the topic. In Bandura’s (1977) seminal work, four major drivers are presented: performance accomplishments, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and physiological states.  

While the study’s primary aim is to better understand the fostering of teachers’ self-efficacy in ESE generally, a comparative approach is used as well, looking at differences between the Nordic countries. While these countries are culturally and historically similar, their approaches to sustainability in education in the past decades have differed (Breiting & Wickenberg, 2009; Straume, 2016). These differences came to light to some degree in the preliminary descriptive analysis of this study, which showed variety between countries in both ESESE and several of the explanatory variables described in the methods section below. The assumed and observed differences in the samples allow for comparative analysis to illuminate the effectiveness of approaches to ESE in teacher education in otherwise (relatively) culturally homogenous populations.  

The data material that was analyzed in the study is the results from the ICCS2016 survey, with survey responses from Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish and Danish social studies teachers and school administrators (N=1372). The respondents of the ICCS survey was sampled from European, Asian and Latin American countries using a geographically stratified probability sampling method on a country-to-country basis (Schulz et al., 2018). The use of this secondary data source allowed for a high reliability and reproducibility of the results but necessitated some limitations as to the operationalization of variables in the analyses. The dependent variable in the analysis is teachers’ self-reported ESE self-efficacy. This concept was measured through a single-item likert scale survey question, asking respondents “How well prepared do you feel to teach the following subject: the environment and sustainable development?”. The explanatory variables used in the analysis all originate from the ICCS2016 survey, and are all measured through likert scales unless otherwise specfied: ESE pre- or in-service training (dummy, yes/no), perceived importance of ESE, teacher autonomy, sustainability practices at school, experience with ESE and amount of teacher collaboration. In addition, a selection of control variables were used, measuring gender, age and each teachers workload (hours of teaching per week) at school. Analysis consisted of, firstly, descriptive analysis of frequencies of dependent and independent variables between countries, as well as correlation analysis of the mentioned variables. Secondly, an OLS regression analysis on the aggregated sample (combining data from the Nordic countries) was conducted, showing statistically significant results worthwhile pursuing further. A final step in the analysis will be to conduct the OLS regression for each nationally representative sample separately, comparing the strengths of associations in the model between them.

The descriptive analysis showed differences in teachers self-reported ESESE between countries, with Swedish teachers reporting the highest belief in their own abilities on the topic. Similarly, Swedish and Finnish teachers had experienced ESE training pre- or in-service to a larger degree than their Norwegian and Danish counterpart. Regression analyses showed that, while the total variance explained by the model was relatively low(R2=.175), several variables had an impact on respondent’s self-efficacy. The strongest association was found with having completed courses on ESE either pre- or in-service (.317). Other statistically significant, though weaker, associations were found between the dependent variable and experiences with ESE(.116), perceptions of the importance of ESE(.126) and teacher autonomy(.089). School-wide sustainability practices and degree of collaboration between teachers, on the other hand, did not have a statistically significant association with the dependent variable. Findings suggest that while self-efficacy in ESE is a complex concept achieved through a range of factors, teacher education, within the frame of the model, plays a central role in aiding teachers in implementing sustainability education. This has implications for the way forward for teacher educators, policymakers and practicing teachers when it comes to further integrating sustainability into educational systems. Subsequent analysis will unveil whether the role of teacher education differs between Nordic countries, and may yield additional insights to be taken into account in this discussion. The study illustrates the need for further research into the implementation of ESE in teacher education, and may point to a need for more qualitative investigation into pre-service teachers learning outcomes and teacher educators’ approaches to the topic.

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