Transformative Agroecology & Sustainable Food Systems Education: Signature Pedagogies, Core Competencies and Capacity Building for Systemic Change

The urgent call to transform food systems in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) has placed education at the heart of global efforts for change. The development of new leadership, systems thinking, and institutional capacity is essential to drive the social, ecological, and ethical transformations required. In this context, a growing body of scholarship—exemplified by the works of Niewolny et al. 2012, Francis et al. 2017, Ebel et al. 2020, Valley et al. 2020, Collier et al. 2021, Bates et al. 2022, Nicklay et al. 2023 —has begun to articulate signature pedagogies in agroecology and sustainable food systems education: pedagogical frameworks that shape how future leaders learn to engage with complexity, act with responsibility, and drive transformation from within food systems.

These post-secondary signature pedagogies are experiential, interdisciplinary, reflexive, and community-engaged. They emphasize co-learning, critical thinking, and the integration of multiple knowledge systems—including Indigenous and traditional ecological knowledge. However, many postsecondary educational efforts remain fragmented or overly technical, often lacking the integrated and transformative qualities needed to empower students and practitioners as change agents. There is a pressing need to document, compare, and critically assess these emerging postsecondary pedagogical models and the courses, programs, and learning environments that embody them.

Focus & Scope: This Frontiers Special Research Topic—Transformative Agroecology and Sustainable Food System Education: Signature Pedagogies, Leadership Development, and Capacity Building for Systemic Change—seeks to examine how postsecondary agroecology and sustainable food system education programs are designing and applying signature pedagogies to foster leadership, institutional innovation, and societal transformation aligned with the SDGs..

We welcome interdisciplinary and international contributions that explore:

● Signature pedagogies in agroecology and sustainable food systems education

● Curriculum design and core competencies in transformative food systems learning

● Case studies of courses, degree programs, field schools, and community-based training models

● Experiential and place-based learning as tools for building leadership and systems thinking

● Integration of Indigenous, local, and traditional ecological knowledge in curriculum and pedagogy

● Youth leadership development, peer learning, and mentorship models

● Institutional collaboration across academic, civil society, and government sectors

● The role of higher education institutions in advancing food sovereignty and agroecology

● Comparative studies across cultural, geographic, or political contexts

● Educational program evaluation and learning outcome assessment frameworks

● Education as a strategy for normalizing SDG-aligned food system transformation

● Measures of the impact of agroecology and sustainable food systems education on student learning outcomes and core competencies.

● Critical social theory and food systems education

Objective: The aim of this Research Topic is to deepen understanding of the educational strategies, institutional innovations, and pedagogical practices that are equipping the next generation of food system leaders. By highlighting signature pedagogies and their role in shaping values, competencies, and agency, this collection seeks to advance theory, practice, and policy in transformative food system education worldwide.

Types of Manuscripts Invited: We welcome submissions that engage with agroecology and food systems education through diverse disciplinary, methodological, and epistemological lenses. Acceptable manuscript types include:

● Original Research Articles

● Case Studies

● Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses

● Policy and Practice Reviews

● Perspective, Opinion, and Commentary Pieces

All submissions should contribute to advancing knowledge, pedagogy, or institutional practice in support of systemic change through education.

Important note: This manuscript summary and scope statement is mandatory for this Research Topic. Authors should copy and paste the scope questions provided in the submission portal and address them when submitting their manuscript summary.

Please do not attempt to download or edit this document, instead copy and paste the questions and address each one when submitting your manuscript summary: document and answer these ahead of your manuscript summary. Please ensure that your answers precede the manuscript summary itself.

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Community Case Study
• Conceptual Analysis
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• ... View all formats

Articles that are accepted for publication by our external editors following rigorous peer review incur a publishing fee charged to Authors, institutions, or funders.

Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Community Case Study
• Conceptual Analysis
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• Perspective
• Policy and Practice Reviews
• Policy Brief
• Review
• Systematic Review
• Technology and Code

Keywords: Agroecology, Food Systems Education, Pedagogies, Leadership Development, SDGs, Systems Thinking, Curriculum Innovation, Capacity Building, Experiential Learning, Indigenous Knowledge, University

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.