Problem-Based Learning and Ecological Economics

Key issues

A number of key issues and lessons are evident from both the project and the module.

Skills and capacities

The student's brief was to consider the sustainability of the market town of Thornbury. She had access to a wide range of material which she had to digest and reflect upon. She then chose local food as the key issue on which she would focus. Her work shows a lengthy process of explaining that choice. Similarly, students faced with the large topic of 'local community' or 'sustainable campus' would need to digest complex material and make an informed choice about focus. This process may improve their decision-making skills.

List of skills the student developed:

• informed choice (see reflections on topic and synthesis framework). She reasoned that local food production was at the heart of sustainability and is linked to so many of the other issues identified by people in Thornbury. She also contrasted the ways in which conventional and ecological economics approaches consider food production.
• literature review; specifically, the selection of significant literature
• primary data collection; specifically survey tools and telephone interviews
• synthesis of different opinions, theories and data - although this needs to be facilitated
• interdisciplinarity (e.g. political power and structures; cognitive dissonance)
• diagnosis of a concrete case
• reflective critique
• contrastive and comparative thought (see exercise 3.1 and reflection)
• policy implementation and limitations of (also evident in Dr. Quilley's module)
• dissemination and talking to an audience (13 November reflection)

The module also stressed contrastive thought, policy implementation and dealing with concrete, complex cases. Group assessment encourages the development of group-working skills.

Assessment

As outlined above, a self-chosen and self-directed project may lead to the achievement of several key learning outcomes.

A managed group project on a topic or case chosen by students (possibly from a range), perhaps applied to a case study in the local area, e.g., a business wanting to act more sustainably, or even the university itself.

• To capture the systems thinking aspect of ecological economics it may be advisable to ask group members to write individual pieces on specific elements: e.g., if the group is considering food, individual members would also consider how transport, housing, and recreation relate to food.
• The project would need to be managed, in order to force students to think early on about their topic and their methodology.

However, institutional constraints on location, ethics, health and safety, etc. may prevent such an approach. For example, lecturers may lack the freedom to be flexible in assessment, particularly in how group work is marked. In that case, a narrower range of topics could be specified; or essays or exercises could be chosen.

A mixture of time-constrained elements could be used, including multiple choice, short answer and essay exam questions. Again, this would assess and develop a range of skills within students.

Thinking differently

In addition to the skills listed above, the ability to think differently might be an outcome from studying ecological economics, particularly if taught via PBL. This may constitute a significant intellectual challenge. As a good example, multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) is an essential feature of ecological economics, but is intuitively difficult.

Students of conventional Economics may find the transition to ecological economics difficult. This was a problem encountered by the student - although she enjoyed the opportunity. This may have been less of a problem to the students on the module, who were non-Economics specialists.

Learning resources

For non-specialists (including the lecturer, Dr. Quilley, in this case) doing ecological economics puts them on a steep learning curve with regards to the technical material. The amount of material in the workbook, in general, felt very intensive. However, Dr. Quilley felt that the textbook was readable in one semester.

Given the structure of the British academic semester, Dr. Quilley felt there was too little time to fully explore the problems from the workbook. Ideally the module would involve much more problem solving with the workbook.

ICT is important in the delivery of this topic, particularly if the requisite resources are developed.

Delivery and engagement

Some students tend to see the work instrumentally in terms of accruing marks; this can affect group dynamics. Consequently, enthusiasm for the module material was mixed.

A crucial exercise is to encourage engagement by demonstrating the context and scale of the sustainability problem. This might be done by:

• highlighting contemporary issues and debates on peak oil, north/south globalism and climate change; or military conflicts; or
• taking a historical approach to capitalism and globalism, ecology of industrialism, 1970s Neo-Malthusian, or the early debates on sustainability; or
• making the problem more personally relevant to students, perhaps focusing on demographics and birth rates: What are their plans for having children?

Students in the module enjoyed the PBL nature of the activities but wished there had been more structure and more time. Because each seminar was PBL, the onus is on the students for learning. This would have worked better if there was greater time to work thoroughly on one problem; example problems from the workbook weren't enough.

In an ideal module situation, the workbook would have been used for a research project (as was the case for the independent student) and then the subsequent work would be part of the teaching exercise. Either way, more problem solving should be incorporated as part of the module.

Suggestions

• If we want to increase the take up in Britain of the Daly textbook and Farley workbook, perhaps the authors would be open to suggestions as to how the books could be adapted to our audience.
• The UK academic community may wish to put together a bid for a small ERSC grant in which several of us do a footprint exercise for a small community but in such a way that we are developing a teaching package for ecological economics. An example of this could be a two-semester Campus Sustainability Project which creates a standardized package. The technical material will have already been completed and smaller exercises would be part of a series of problems that students build upon in their learning.
• Another idea would be to bring in academics (mostly from the United States) who have worked on ecological economics problems in their modules, and set up an exchange. Perhaps two or three people could go to the Gund Institute to work with the graduate class. Once UK academics felt confident in the model used at the Institute, they could emulate it within the Transition Network structure.

Resources

• Dr Steve Quilley's module guidance is available to download (Word): outline, each week's questions, and group work/essay questions.
• The Gund Institute of Ecological Economics has an online Introduction to Ecological Economics course.
• The Eco League in the United States is a model of liberal arts with a sustainability twist. They grow their own food and meet outside, too.