Global Citizenship & Sustainability
What is Global Citizenship?
Global Citizenship is about recognizing how the world interconnects, understanding and respecting diversity, and the impact of one's actions on others. These individuals think of themselves as members of the global community, where they have a sense of responsibility, often engaging with global issues and promoting values like justice, equality and sustainability.
Why is it important for our students to be citizen of the world?
Global issues, like poverty and climate change, are faced worldwide. Understanding these problems and their relevance to individuals can help students be more self-aware. Collaborative action and addressing solutions together will be more effective and impactful in solving these issues. Learning cultural differences allows students to understand the behaviour of others, helps them to avoid conflict and promotes communication, peace and sustainability.
Global Citizenship in Suzhou
At Dulwich College International, we aim for our schools, staff and students to “Live Worldwise”. This means Sustainability and Global Citizenship are infused and embedded across our whole organisation. Our goal is to encourage our communities to make informed choices, take inspired action and create positive impact.
As part of a holistic education, we are committed to providing purpose-driven learning experiences that are guided by a deep sense of connection to people and the planet. As an organisation, we are also committed to developing, measuring, and maintaining sustainable practices.
We have defined four pillars that shape our sustainability and global citizenship goals and outcomes: Learning, Planet, People, and Policy.
Global Citizenship in Suzhou
Learning: We are committed to meaningful and relevant learning that nurtures students as global citizens.
Through delivering innovative and world-changing education offerings that are wellbeing-focused, academically rigorous, socially and emotionally enriching, safe, holistic and world-class, we nurture leaders who are passionate and equipped to create solutions to the world’s problems, both today and in the future.
Planet: We are committed to maximising positive impact and minimising harm, with sustainable and regenerative ideas and practices for the planet.
We have embarked upon a carbon roadmap across all of our schools in a three-step process of carbon mapping, carbon reduction and carbon offsetting.
People: We are committed to working together as a rich and diverse community for the benefit of all.
To reflect this, we continually invest in staff through our “Accelerate” programme and have launched the Worldwise Alumni Network (WAN), which provides alumni with shared lifelong social and professional opportunities. We continue to focus on the health and safety of our students and staff, prioritising wellbeing and offering meaningful engagement as active citizens and through community participation.
Policy: We are committed to building the systems and strong organisational structures to support collective ambition.
We are compliant in all areas across all our schools, including rapidly developing our cybersecurity and data privacy capability and have established a robust internal Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) framework to ensure we hold ourselves accountable at all levels of our organisation.
Sustainability & Global Citizenship Competency Framework
At Dulwich, we highlight to our students what is global citizenship and why it is crucial in today's world. We connect with, care for and take action in environmental, social and economic sustainable areas across local and global communities. We embed sustainability and global citizenship into our curriculum, campus and community putting the student in the centre of decision making and SGC activities.
Our 4 Sustainability & Global Citizenship competencies include environmental, social, economic and service leadership. This integrated approach to action-based learning, maximses the impact of our SGC programme. It also supports our students as they Graduate WORLDWISE, access top universities, enter sustainability led workplaces and make a positive difference in the world.
Environmental Protection
There is a pressing need for us as a community to protect the environment to secure a better future for our planet and our children.
To achieve this, DCSZ students from Primary school through to Senior school actively participate in hands-on learning, campus initiatives and service leadership activities that support our local community and the UN’s global Sustainable Development Goals, successfully incorporating global citizenship in such curriculums. These will highlight the importance and impact of collaborative action, where several individuals do their parts as a whole.
Social & Intercultural Competencies
Our students strive to make a positive impact not just on the planet but on the people and community that live within it. At DCSZ, we connect with, care for, and celebrate people & different cultures, locally and globally developing the intercultural competencies required for the 21st century.
Intercultural competence is the ability to use knowledge, skills, and conceptual understanding to connect with and care for others and to act with commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice for all.
Economic Impact
When making positive and practical impact on sustainability and global citizenship we cannot underestimate the impact of entrepreneurship, business, economic and commercial interests.
At DCSZ we look through the lens of a sustainable business understanding our consumption impact, economic drivers and developing sustainable financial and entrepreneurial skills within our students.
Our Global Citizenship and Sustainability initiative prepares students for an uncertain world where leaders will need to work together to resolve sustainability challenges and create real world solutions.
Service Leadership
At DCSZ, we promote student agency and positive social action. This means, we maximise students’ decision making power and input into how the curriculum, campus and community. Students learn best when taking action, making decisions and applying their knowledge.
By maximizing student input under the guidance of our expert teachers, students become more engaged in their learning and through service leadership activities develop leadership, empathy, communication & influence skills – all essential assets for global citizens in a modern society.
