Connecting environment and community: Building students’ capacities as future environmental professionals

Portus, Rosamund; Williams, Sara-Jayne

Abstract

As we find ourselves in a period of environmental emergency, it has become clear that we need to transform environmental management teaching. Critically, we need to prepare students to become professionals who respond to environmental challenges as intersectional crises that require community-driven solutions. In response to this need, we developed a module centred around building students’ capacities to recognise the need for genuine inclusion and diverse representation to achieve authentic participation in environmentally focused projects.

The module content uses innovative teaching methods to develop students’ confidence as leaders in a variety of environmentally focused fields, providing them with the opportunity to connect their academic knowledge with real local and global cultural contexts, experience different methods of public engagement (e.g. World cafes, guided discussions), and lead on visioning, developing and delivering their own participation projects. With an emphasis on inclusion, students need to think about what true representation and participation looks like. The delivery of this project, and students’ associated reflections, form the module assessment. Students’ experience of the module and assessment will be reflected in the paper.

In addition to nurturing students’ confidence as communicators, the content of this module allows students to build connections within their peer group (an opportunity which has been previously hindered due to COVID-19), foster their capacity for self-reflection, and develop their ability to work effectively within groups.

This paper presents this module and assessment as a case study example of a pedagogical approach which transforms students’ capacities as both individuals and future environmental professionals.

• Presentation Conference Type: Presentation / Talk
• Conference Name: Transformative Teaching: Focus on Pedagogy 2022
• Start Date: Nov 15, 2022
• End Date: Nov 17, 2022
• Deposit Date: Nov 18, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: Nov 18, 2022
• Keywords: Teaching, Pedagogy
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/10146794
• Related Public URLs: https://amps-research.com/conference/teaching/