Dear All, Here is a compilation of the ideas that were sent regarding non-traditional student projects. Lots of great work going on among our members!
Shannon ******** · A series of interviews with professionals in a sustainable development field (e.g. food aid, water) · Detailed time line of historical events in a particular area of sustainable development – including commentary about the relationships between events · An applied project for a development organization – for example through the United Nations Online Volunteers program: https://www.onlinevolunteering.org/en/vol/ · Writing a weekly blog about sustainable development events · Correcting Wikipedia entries · Examine how one event is covered on different types of media (print newspapers, twitter, radio etc..) using content analysis · Identifying ideas for applying the UN Sustainable Develoment Goals to the local level Hi Shannon, Lucky you - such a small class! I've been integrating contemplative practices and study/action projects into two new courses this year: Person/Planet Politics (an interdisciplinary Honors seminar) and Anthropocene Politics (more political theory.) I've attached both syllabi to give you a sense of both of these unconventional pedagogies. In particular, the action projects were a great success -- definitely more exciting and innovative than the service learning courses I've been teaching for the past 20 years. Many of the students in the Honors seminar did some sort of art as part of their final projects. That was an option and I was delighted that about 3/4 of them went that route. Virtually all of them described themselves as "artistically challenged," so this was a pleasant surprise. Here's last quarter's student blogL http://h392personplanetpolitics.weebly.com/ Not well organized but there are some real gems in it. Let me know if you want to know more about the kinds of contemplative practices I use & I'll be happy to send you one of my essays on the topic. Enjoy! ~Karen ******************* * A website (perhaps using Wix) on a specific aspect of sustainable development. What it means to you, different initiatives around the world, current implications in terms of policy, etc. * An elaborate infographic on sustainable development. (They would have to make it from scratch, because if they used a template it would be too easy of a project.) * A 45 minute long lesson on one or two sustainable development initiatives in the developing world, including a presentation and group activity. * Completing the Economic Evaluation online course (from Environmental Management) and writing a report that applies an economic evaluation to a development initiative either underway or idea. *************** If your course includes a module on food, you can take them dumpster diving! I have done this with a few environment classes and it never ceases to amaze me how much perfectly good food we find thrown away in dumpsters behind supermarkets and restaurants. Coupled with a lecture on food waste (or seeing the movie “Dive”) and some stats on global hunger, the experience makes a big impression on the students. Sometimes only a few students have wanted to go, and I took them myself. Last year, most of my environment class wanted to go (20 students), so I divided them into teams and sent them on their own to dumpsters all over Omaha with the instructions to a) take pictures and b) don’t get arrested. For your purposes, a project could include an analysis of ag/food production, a report on food recovery efforts in the community, extra credit if they invent a recipe using the dumpster food they find, extra-extra credit if they fix the recipe and bring it in for the class! -Beth ***************************** Shannon, I sometimes have my students examine how a specific event is covered on different media (including traditional and social media). We pick something like Earth Day, and then each student picks a medium of choice (twitter, newspapers, NGO websites, TV news, etc). We talk about how to sample content and how to analyze content, and then they go find the embedded messages in the communications. They enjoy it, gives them some content-analysis skill, underscores the continuing value of "non-social" media, and produces some interesting results....Ken Conca ****** During my own master's at American University in a small grad seminar on urban development, I and several other students essentially conducted practical research on behalf of a cycling advocacy group and produced a rough draft policy report examining why a particular ward in Washington DC that leans low income and minority in demographics seemed distinctly less interested in cycling as a transport mode. The goal was to help the NGO formulate better community programs and interventions. The experience of the grad seminar drove the professor to incorporate a more detailed survey as a learning tool for an undergrad class the following semester. I assisted that class project as well. The two surveys together were one of the most important experiences of my grad career and ultimately this pushed me into additional study of heavy survey methodology during a Fulbright. I now live abroad in India and oversee research for a small NGO and rely on focused team surveys to generate scholarship as well as data for our own conservation programs. If you have 20 students, with a bit of training, oversight in survey design and methods and someone helping them through IRB, you can easily get a decent sample size that could answer a question. Working with an NGO made the process that much more meaningful. Am happy to provide more details on the experience if needed. Warm regards, Adam Jadhav ********************* Hi Shannon: One idea I have been toying with is how to take the Sustainable Development Goals and make them local. Involving youth and doing local implementation projects is part of how the SDGs will be implemented at all levels. So the project I have in mind is to have my students go through the goals and, either working in small groups or individually, look to see what we are already doing on campus to implement some of the goals and what we could be doing. For example, on our campus, our elementary school tutoring program can help to achieve universal primary education for underserved children. Our rooftop garden, which produces vegetables during the summer, is actually urban agriculture, which can help to spread the concept of urban agriculture and all of this is part of SDG Goal 2. Then we can look at things we can do t better implement energy efficiency, reduce pollution (waste, including food waste), etc. I hope this makes sense. Pam *********** Dear Shannon, I’d be really interested in the compiled list! One thing that I thought about doing this year is letting them correct a Wikipedia entry. A colleague did this last year and said it was an interesting experiment. Thanks for putting this together, Josephine ***************** You might have a look at a reader my colleague, Simon Nicholson, and I recently edited: Global Environmental Politics: From Person to Planet (http://www.amazon.com/Global-Environmental-Politics-Person-Planet/dp/1612056490). In addition to including the 'greatest hits' of readings, each section ends with a nontraditional, experiential exercise for students to connect with the material. You can request an e-copy examination copy from Routledge at: https://www.routledge.com/products/9781612056494 Sadly, Amazon has yet to include the Table of Contents. I'm pasting it below. Best, Paul [cid:[email protected]] Global Environmental Politics: From Person to Planet<http://www.paradigmpublishers.com/Books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=393777> TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction: Living in an Environmental Age PART I: STATE OF THE PLANET Section 1: Species Unbound: Humanity’s Environmental Impact Introduction 1. Enter the Anthropocene, Elizabeth Kolbert 2. State of the Species, Charles C. Mann 3. Humanity’s Potential, Alex Steffen Section 1 Exercise: “The Time Machine” Section 2: Four Planetary Challenges: Climate, Extinction, Water, and Food Introduction 4. Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math, Bill McKibben 5. End of the Wild, Stephen M. Meyer 6. Where Has All the Water Gone? Maude Barlow 7. The Global Food Crisis, Lester Brown Section 2 Exercise: “Fries with That? Tracing Personal Consumption” Section 3: Causes of Environmental Harm Introduction 8. Too Many Americans? Thomas Friedman 9. A Finite Earth? Bill McKibben 10. Consequences of Consumerism, Erik Assadourian 11. Use Energy, Get Rich, and Save the Planet, John Tierney Section 3 Exercise: “Where do Babies Come From? The Causes of Population Growth” PART II: STATES, MARKETS, AND SOCIETY: GEOPOLITICAL RESPONSES TO UNSUSTAINABILITY Section 4: International State System Introduction 12. Rio Declaration on Environment and Development 13. Brief History of International Environmental Cooperation, Jennifer Clapp and Peter Dauvergne 14. What’s Wrong with Climate Politics? Paul Harris 15. State Sovereignty Endangers the Planet, Richard Falk Section 4 Exercise: “Talking with the United Nations” Section 5: Economy Introduction 16. The Promise of Corporate Environmentalism, Peter Dauvergne and Jane Lister 17. Environmental Economics 101: Overcoming Market Failures, Paul Krugman 18. Capitalism vs. Climate, Naomi Klein Section 5 Exercise: “What’s for Dinner?” Section 6: Civil Society Introduction 19. The Power of Environmental Activism, Paul Hawken 20. Forcing Cultural Change, Paul Wapner 21. The Wrong Kind of Green, Johann Hari Section 6 Exercise: “Unpacking the NGO World and Taking Action” Section 7: Race, Class, and Geopolitical Difference Introduction 22. The Delusion of Sustainable Growth, Herman E. Daly 23. Who is an Economy For? Rethinking GDP, Jonathan Rowe 24. One Atmosphere, Two Worlds, Peter Singer 25. Environmental Colonialism: The Perverse Politics of Climate Change, Anil Agarwal and Sunita Narain 26. Environmental Racism and the Environmental Justice Movement, Robert Bullard Section 7 Exercise: “A Toxic Thank You” PART III: FROM PERSON TO PLANET: INTO A LIVABLE FUTURE Section 8: Thinking Strategically Introduction 27. Leverage Points Toward a Sustainable World, Donella H. Meadows 28. Plant a Tree, Buy a Bike, Save the World? Michael F. Maniates 29. The Poverty of Lifestyle Change, Paul Wapner and John Willoughby 30. Why Bother? Michael Pollan Section 8 Exercise: “Two Minutes to Sustainability: Moving Governments, the Economy, and Public” Section 9: Political Imagination Introduction 31. Island Civilization: 1,000 Years into the Future, Roderick Frazier Nash 32. A is for Acid Rain, B is for Bee, Joanne Harris 33. The Future is Local, Wendell Berry 34. Technological Salvation, Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus 35. Geoengineering: Reformatting the Planet for Climate Protection? Simon Nicholson 36. Humility in a Climate Age, Paul Wapner 37. How to be Hopeful, Barbara Kingsolver Section 9 Exercise: “Calling All Earthlings: Self and Planetary Stewardship” I've been on both sides of this in the classroom: it's a pretty easy and often illuminating assignment to ask students to do individual carbon footprint analyses, measure their water use, etc. There are plenty of tools available for this sort of thing. The students are usually surprised by their own results. But I believe Dr. Harrison is wrong on his central point, that "The only way to change a complex social system is from the bottom up." In fact, there are now years of research showing that an individualization-only approach bears little fruit, specifically of the kind he notes: that asking your students to change their behavior with regard to sustainability "May change how their friends live as well, and so on." In fact, without top-down policy change and regulation, there is little hope of addressing the challenges that face us with regards to energy and natural resource use and depletion. But I am comfortable being one of the "dour environmentalists" that Dr. Harrison refers to on his website, who believes that government regulation is necessary in order to achieve social change. And by the way, a great place to start in the literature on individualization is with the work of Mike Maniates, our list admin. In this vein, when I teach an introductory class on sustainability, and it is small enough for this sort of assignment to be manageable, I ask the students to engage directly in the democratic process. One way to do this is have them identify who their elected officials are, wherever they are registered to vote, and have them choose an issue they care about that their elected official can speak to, and write a letter to that elected official. I assign this early in the semester, and then work with them closely on the letters, reviewing drafts with them, and then have them send the letters, present them to the class, and report back to the class if they receive a response before the end of the semester. If students own up to not being registered to vote, I have been known to require them to register to vote, especially in a presidential election year, which itself provides a wonderful opportunity for discussion and engagement. This coming semester, for example, I am assigning my students in an advanced class to run a nonpartisan voter registration drive on campus. THAT is the sort of individualization that I can get behind! ******** I've been reluctant to offer my two cents but I think the footprint exercise I've been using for the last 10 years or so bridges the gap between Neil and Richard on this issue. My GEP class is cross-listed as ENVIR and POL S, and the environmental studies students in particular tend to be pretty apolitical. With the aim of getting them to question their tendency towards individualization, I ask them to first calculate their current footprint and then to calculate their footprint as if they were living in a DC but using THE EXACT SAME NUMBERS as their first calculation, and then to explain the difference (which tends to be enormous.) I then ask them to reflect on whether the footprint exercise is political or not. If you're curious, I've attached the exercise. What has been most fascinating -- and totally unexpected --is how students have become increasingly able to explain the discrepancy over time. When I first devised the assignment, even the TAs didn't immediately see why they might have a 5-earth footprint in the US but a 1/2-earth footprint in Ethiopia using exactly the same numbers. And not only did virtually every student draw a blank, a good number of them struggled to grasp that they were responsible for one 300-millionth of every US road, airport, military base, etc. even after I explained it to them. Over time, I noticed that the TAs began to get it right away; in the last three years or so, 25-40% of the students get it right away. I can't see any other explanation other than the possibility that young people are becoming increasingly capable of systemic thinking -- even if they're not overtly learning systems theory (something I also teach and which virtually no students come in knowing.) Is it possible, I wonder, that the capacity to intuit connections is a consequence of our increasingly networked society? Just a thought... I wonder whether others on this list have comparable findings. Does this mean that I agree with Mike Maniates' "individualization thesis?" NO! I assign his wonderful article alongside the ecological footprint paper, which sets us up very nicely for the big question: Do lifestyle choices matter - and if so, why? Given my most recent book on ecovillages around the world, it's clear where I stand, but I let the students tease this out for themselves. They come up with things like: - decreasing one's footprint from 6 to 4 earths is worth doing; - living with a sense of integrity is important even if it doesn't change the world; - having a sense of agency in one's own life can empower us to make a larger difference through political action. In the end, though, they generally realize that lifestyle changes are insufficient and collective action is therefore necessary. So, getting back to the exchange between Richard and Neil, I take a "both/and" stance with plenty of room for deep conversation. How about helping your students live more sustainably? More than regurgitating some vague theories about sustainable development they would have to think about how they live. If this changes their behavior, it may change how their friends live as well, and so on. Our modern lifestyle is unsustainable. So, change the system. The only way to change a complex social system is from the bottom-up. The best way to do that is to show people how they can save the planet while improving their lives. The hair shirt of self-denial offered by so many environmental writings is unattractive (too much like dieting?). The alternative of nanny-state regulation seems un-American, especially now. Instead people can save the planet by pursuing their personal well-being (and what's more American than capitalist self-interest?). [Beware shameless self-promotion: the theory for this approach is laid out in my book Sustainable Capitalism and the Pursuit of Well-Being - now out in paperback - and I'm working on a 'how to' book for 'everyman/everywoman' and a supporting website.] First your students need to understand how they have learned their lifestyle and why they so often use 'retail therapy' to feel good, for a short term fix of their problems. Exercise: ask them to describe how they have been trapped on the hedonic treadmill and give examples of how they consume to remedy unhappiness. Can they explain why retail therapy leaves them unfulfilled and unsatisfied? Why is it addictive? Second they need to understand their psychological needs: autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Exercise: ask them to give examples from their personal experience of how satisfying any/each of these needs made them feel. How could they satisfy these essential needs in the future? How would that change their lives? Third your students could examine Flow, the state of total engagement with an activity (and then with life). Exercise: have they ever experienced Flow? How did it make them feel? How does Flow relate to Mindfulness? How does Flow relate to their psychological needs? If you want to go further, you could get into issues of financial resilience, debt management, and investing that all satisfy psychological needs better than retail therapy and reduce consumption. While these issues may be beyond the purview of the class, they are important for well-being (viz the suffering from the 2007-2008 housing meltdown and the pain of recessions and unemployment). These are matters I am particularly interested in because of my CPA/CA training. I have not developed a syllabus for teaching this approach - perhaps I should - and these are just a few ideas I cobbled together in a few minutes. If you are interested in using this approach, I would be happy to work with you in any way you need, ___________________________ Shannon K. Orr, Ph.D. Associate Professor/Graduate Coordinator 118 Williams Hall Bowling Green, OH Department of Political Science Bowling Green State University [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> https://twitter.com/CapacityBldg4SD -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "gep-ed" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
