At best, learning is a voyage from wonder to wisdom, a journey from innocence to insight. Learning blazes the trail to individual integrity and, potentially, to global unity. Education, the systematized process of learning, is regarded as a means of empowering the disenfranchised and catalysing human development. Identified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a fundamental human right, education is considered essential for the exercise of all other human rights.

However, existing educational systems – their structures, contents and methodologies – are as diverse as the foliage in a jungle and, for many people, as scarce as shade in a desert. At its worst, education has been a vehicle for propaganda, indoctrination and maintaining the status quo. Outdated methods, poorly trained teachers, irrelevant content, insufficient resources and unequal access have, among other things, contributed to education being unable to adequately meet the urgent needs of a world characterized by complexity, contention and change.

Today, education focuses largely on achieving economic progress for individuals and nations rather than developing integrity and global solidarity with people, nature and future generations. Access to education is not yet universal. In many schools, the basic elements of learning are poorly mobilized causing the effectiveness of education to be severely diminished. Repeated demands have been made for significant changes in education in order to enable individuals and communities to counteract the entropy that threatens the world at present. The call for a global movement based upon a new social contract for education has been raised by people around the globe.

Despite many serious setbacks, numerous efforts are being made to implement reforms in education. Instead of viewing education as an immutable activity, new educational paradigms have been emerging. Lifelong learning for all has become an accepted principle. Education for sustainable development has been promoted in order to spur responsible, environmentally friendly behaviour. Interdisciplinarity has gained momentum. Digital learning has entered the stage with force. Global citizenship education, while still infrequent, is no longer shunned. Collaborative, explorative education is taking shape – education that regards each person as a mine rich in gems and the collective process of the discovery of new understanding as one carried out not only for the benefit of each individual but for all of humanity.