Abstract

• The General Education Foundation (GEF) Programme, with its two interdisciplinary courses In Dialogue with Humanity (UGFH) and In Dialogue with Nature (UGFN), is designed with the vision of shaping students into better global citizens by cultivating their knowledge, attitudes, and values through reading classics.
• The intended learning outcomes of both GEF courses state the vision of fostering response to the contemporary human condition and informed personal judgment-in personal life, society, and scientific inquiries and applications. Many of the issues addressed in GEF are closely related to the United Nations’ (UN) purported Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
• However, students with no direct experience of related contexts tend not to appreciate the ideas, problems, and dilemmas presented in the classics, and hence their relevance to contemporary global issues such as sustainability.
• Based on the successful attempt to introduce activities that promote experiential-learning through farming in UGFH/UGFN, and inspired by the University’s leadership in promoting SDGs in Hong Kong, we propose to design new schemes of SDGs-connected experiential-learning for the GEF Program in the contexts of permaculture, aquaculture, and meditation.
• Our ultimate goal is to deepen students’ understanding of the classics by positing their ideas in meaningful, modem contexts, and to foster reflection on how efforts in permaculture, aquaculture, and meditation may serve the SDGs. To this end, we propose three concrete objectives as follows:
  1. to produce micro-modules and upgrade e-learning instruments for experiential-learning through permaculture, aquaculture, and meditation in the GEF courses;
  2. to implement experiential-learning that enriches teaching and learning in the foundation courses and supports the SDGs concerned; and
  3. to develop viable experiential-learning schemes for the GEF Programme.