Designing sustainable schemes: Integrating Vergnaud and Morin in education for sustainability

This conceptual essay reframes Education for Sustainability by extending Vergnaud’s notion of “schemes” into a new construct we call “sustainable schemes.” This design-oriented cognitive framework integrates Morin’s seven knowledges, offering a way to support sustainable, context-sensitive action in educational settings. Focusing on the Tunisian context, the paper identifies the limitations of behavior-centered approaches that reduce sustainability education to awareness-raising and behavioral transmission. Instead, it argues for a systemic and reflective model of learning where knowledge, skills, and values are dynamically mobilized for sustainability. The framework articulates key operational invariants—including systemic interdependence, extended temporality, productive uncertainty, and extended responsibility—and the corresponding rules of action that can guide curriculum design, assessment practices, and teacher professionalization. Illustrative examples from Tunisia’s educational policies and training materials clarify how these sustainable schemes can inform planning heuristics and evaluation rubrics for transformative learning. Ultimately, this essay emphasizes the need to rethink teacher education and professional development through cognitive and pedagogical lenses that enable teachers to enact sustainability principles in practice, thereby contributing to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals and the formation of a conscious, responsible generation.