A Sustainability-Oriented Lifecycle Framework for Educational Technology Software

Abstract

The rapid expansion of educational technology (EdTech) has profoundly reshaped global learning environments while raising growing concerns about software sustainability, including technical debt, excessive energy consumption, and limited product longevity. Current development models often emphasize functionality and scalability but rarely incorporate long-term ecological and pedagogical considerations. To address this gap, this study introduces the Sustainability-Oriented Educational Software Lifecycle (SESL) framework, which systematically embeds sustainability principles into every phase of software development. Drawing on a comparative case study of three representative platforms-Moodle, ClassDojo, and Coursera-the research integrates qualitative evidence from documentation analysis, stakeholder interviews, and lifecycle indicators to identify the primary drivers and inhibitors of sustainability in EdTech. The findings reveal five major sustainability drivers-modular architecture, community governance, ethical data practices, energy-efficient deployment, and pedagogical traceability-counterbalanced by barriers such as short product cycles, centralized control, and the lack of standardized evaluation metrics. The SESL framework establishes five iterative sustainability checkpoints throughout the software lifecycle, reframing sustainability from a terminal assessment into a continuous, feedback-oriented process. By bridging sustainable software engineering with educational technology design, this study provides both a theoretical and practical foundation for fostering resilient, inclusive, and ecologically responsible EdTech ecosystems.