Teaching for tomorrow: trust, agency and sustainability in higher education

Rachel Forsyth and Mirjam Glessmer. Keynote on Teaching for tomorrow: trust, agency and sustainability in higher education What we do in our classrooms – or online – matters. In addition to qualifying students with disciplinary skills and knowledge, and socializing them into their future professional roles, education also has the purpose of what Biesta calls subjectification: becoming autonomous and independent in thinking and acting. Whatever content we teach, our shared practices with students influence how we all see our role in the world and how we work with current and future challenges. In this presentation, we will discuss how we need to start practising now for the life we want together, in an equitable and democratic society, and how this practice now is a fundamental requirement for a sustainable world of the future. We will share concrete suggestions for what to do to build trust with students as the foundation for learning, touch on the influence of GenAI in this context, and make suggestions for conversations about and for sustainability in any course. Rachel Forsyth, academic developer at Lund University Mirjam Glessmer, academic developer at LTH’s Centre for Engineering Education Keynote delivered at the Stockholm University Teachers' Conference — teaching for democracy and sustainability on March 19, 2026. Recorded on the same occasion at Campus Albano. Length 40:11. Conference organizer was Centre for the Advancement of University Teaching.