The project SUSTE aims at professional development of sustainability competences through multimodal storytelling in the context of ECEC (Early Childhood Education and Care). The research focuses on mutual learning processes of participating practitioners, student teachers and researchers. The project has two phases: 1) to study how sustainability is currently envisioned and enacted in Finnish ECEC; 2) to arrange research circles, tutoring, workshops, and seminars for practitioners and student teachers.

The expected outcomes of the project are to prompt the development of new sustainability theories and practices, and enhance further dialogue between researchers and practitioners. Nordic perspectives of ECEC, contemporary aesthetic theory and arts-based practices, relational ontology and epistemology, and critical phenomenology influence the project.