Promoting and Prioritizing the Sustainable Development Goals in Young People

Abstract

This project studies how to raise awareness of the environment and sustainability among secondary school students. The goal is for them to become aware of their role in transforming the world, in order to integrate the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) into students’ daily educational environment. The goal is to attain the highest possible level of diversity in terms of age, possible knowledge of the SDGs, and environmental awareness. Another important factor is geographical distribution, with the inclusion of students from rural and urban schools. The study was developed within the framework of Forest and Sustainability, a project designed for secondary schools in Catalonia, using interactive learning tools. Survey participants (a total of 1106) are asked to choose and prioritize five SDGs. To obtain information on the trends in the responses, the program Minitab Statistical Software (v.22) was used. The SDGs with the highest score are SDG 1 (No Poverty), SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), SDG 5 (Gender Equality), and SDG 16 (Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions). The humanitarian and health factors concern members of the sample group most, with very interesting results when comparing the responses by gender, educational level, and rural or urban schools’ participants.