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Perched next to the tranquil, shady slopes of the Botanical Gardens in a small building on Rhodes University campus, the Environmental Learning Research Centre (ELRC) is unsuspecting. With only the odd student, administrator, or researcher popping out occasionally, a passerby would be forgiven for thinking that not much happens at the ELRC. But as the 2024 Rhodes University Research Report demonstrates, they would be misled. For all its quiet that gives platform to the sunbirds chirping in the acacia tree outside, the ELRC is one of the busiest and most productive nodes on campus.
Researchers and students at the ELRC are engaged in prolific publication, strong international and local conference attendance, a steady stream of workshops and knowledge sharing, policy-facing research supported by high-profile development organisations and funds, and innovative interdisciplinary graduate studies.
At its helm is the Director, Distinguished Professor Lotz-Sisitka, who came in at number three of Rhodes University’s Top 30 Researchers for 2024. Additionally, Professor Lotz-Sisitka was awarded the South African Education Research Association Honours Award, which recognises a career-long contribution to educational research in South Africa. Professor Lotz-Sisitka holds the SARChi Chair of Global Change and Social Learning Systems, working closely with the university’s own Chair of Environment and Sustainability Education, Professor Eureta Rosenberg.
A look at the numbers
The 2024 Research Report, published in November 2025, is testament to the dedication and hard work of the administrators, researchers, and students who are at the heart of the ELRC.
The Centre produced 25 peer-reviewed journal articles, graduated eight PhDs, hosted seven postdoctoral researchers, and contributed to 68 research-based engagements, reflecting its expanding national and international footprint. Overall, it hosted 55 registered postgraduate scholars, including the first cohort of the Postgraduate Diploma in Sustainability Learning, who graduated in March 2025.
Developing theory and methodology
The centre has four central research tracks, with one focused on theory and methodology development, for which a central highlight in 2024 was Professor Eureta Rosenberg’s keynote address at the World Environmental Education Congress on evaluation methodology. Professor Rosenberg emphasised how mainstream instruments for evaluating environmental education outcomes are often inappropriate because pathways to social change through education are often open-ended, longer-term, and non-linear, requiring sustained, reflexive, and holistic evaluation.
Dr Taryn Pereira-Kaplan, who is now a senior researcher within the ELRC, completed a PhD focused on transdisciplinary research praxis with social movements, specifically looking at how scholar-activists and small-scale fishers can collaborate to achieve social justice in the context of ocean governance. Distinguished Professor Lotz-Sisitka continued to strengthen theory and methodology around transformative and transgressive social learning, which is how collaborative learning between individuals, communities, or groups can take place in the service of positive societal change.
Social learning for transformation
The second research track takes the theory of transformative social learning into practice, focusing on catalytic studies which demonstrate the potential for collaborative educational processes to foster change. Dr Dylan McGarry, a Research Associate in the ELRC, won two National Humanities and Social Science Awards, one for a collaborative art exhibition catalogue and another for an animation video, both linked to his work in the One Ocean Hub. These projects aimed to strengthen and expand sustainable ocean governance through platforming and collaborating with communities who are deeply linked to the sea yet often neglected in decision-making, as such significantly advancing transformative social learning.
Green skills learning pathways
The third track is green skills learning pathways, which studies formal and informal educational pathways and networks for green jobs. A strong partnership was developed between the ELRC and the Wits Centre for Researching Education and Labour, with several projects advancing knowledge of skills development in the Just Energy Transition, including studies to inform reskilling and upskilling workers in at risk occupations and jobs within the mining and automotive industries. This includes research projects funded by the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) respectively.
A United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) project in collaboration with Youth Market Place (YOMA), a digital platform for learning, training and skills building for young people, has been extended. This project seeks to advance understanding and implementation of South Africa ‘green learn to earn’ pathways, i.e. green skills development journeys for earning and employment.
Informing and strengthening the education system through synthesis and community of practice
The fourth track is centred on strengthening the education system, in part by synthesising the relevant and dynamic research and practice in the field. Distinguished Professor Lotz-Sisitka wrote two ambitious synthesis papers in 2024. One was focused on a Global South view of emancipatory agency using Cultural Historical Activity Theory research, which looks at broader socially embedded activity systems to understand how people learn. The other paper synthesises 10 years of research on transformative and transgressive learning, which is broadly defined as education aimed at social change.
Wrapping up the DSI/NRF Community of Practice (CoP) on Social Learning and Sustainable Development was also a key synthesis activity in 2024. The CoP focused on transformative social learning that supports knowledge co-development, and knowledge uptake and use for solution oriented sustainable development actions.
New research programmes
Several research projects were started in 2024 and continue today. The Sustainability Starts with Teachers (SST) programme was extended through a new project with ERASMUS, which will expand the focus to leadership within Education for Sustainable Development. It will be implemented with 10 University partners throughout Southern Africa.
Professor Eureta Rosenberg is spearheading a new Spencer Foundation project associated with TRANSECTS to develop methodology and evaluation approaches for transdisciplinary teaching and learning in biosphere reserves in South Africa, Canada, and Germany. TRANSECTS (Transdisciplinary International Learning Laboratories for Sustainability) is a 6-year, international initiative launched in 2022 that focuses on reforming sustainability education by bridging the gap between academia and practice.
The ELRC was also a founding partner of the Future Earth Africa Hub Leadership Centre, which was established at Rhodes University in partnership with the NRF and the University of Pretoria to look at cross-cutting themes related to ‘Ecology, Economy, and Society’, ‘Water Security’, and ‘Education for Sustainable Development’.
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