8. Application of resilience theory to education for sustainable development Chair: Marianne Krasny, Professor, Dept of Natural Resources, Cornell University, USA Panel members: Nadarajah Sriskandarajah, Professor of Environmental Communication, Dept of Urban and Rural Development , Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences Stephen Sterling, Schumacher Reader in Education for Sustainability, Centre for Sustainable Futures, University of Plymoth, UK Keith Tidball, Extension Associate, Initiative for Civic Ecology, Department of Natural Resources Description: Similar to the field of environmental management, environmental education has sought to move from a focus on humans as separate from nature to a concept of integrated socio-ecological systems, and from traditional instructional methods to those emphasizing networking, social learning, and participation. In short, environmental education is adopting a sustainability perspective, as spelled out in the documents supporting the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). However, ESD lacks a unifying theoretical framework. We contend that through applying resilience and systems theories to ESD, we not only enrich the scholarly discussion but also are able to develop guidelines that help education practitioners more effectively meet their sustainability goals. An example comes from applying the notions of nested feedback loops, diversity, and self-organization to the design of community education programs in cities. Such educational programs build on and enhance existing urban socio-ecological assets, for instance the greening activities of displaced persons (e.g., migrants from rural areas and immigrants from less developed countries), who seize the initiative to turn vacant lots into community and memorial gardens, community forests, and other green spaces. These “civic ecology” activities not only aid in resilience of displaced persons at the individual level, but also contribute to local biodiversity and to the diversity of individuals engaged in resource management in cities, and thus may be a factor in resilience at the community level. An education program in which young people work alongside and learn from adult “civic ecologists” about planting practices and cultures may result in the adults, who are often marginalized by the larger society, feeling valued by outsiders. This in turn may lead to the adult civic ecologists’ further engagement in their community, for example, through advocating for green spaces and for educational programs. Such feedback loops may lead to “emergent” properties (e.g., greater biological and cultural diversity when adults and youth together create new garden plots) that stem from the learning activities and from connections formed between youth and adults. We use the term Civic Ecology Education to describe ESD programs that draw on and through a series of feedback loops enhance existing socio-ecological diversity and other community assets. Civic Ecology Education programs can also facilitate new modes of knowledge production at multiple levels. At the level of the individual program, youth and lay persons document the knowledge of gardeners, and working in partnership with scientists, describe the biological and cultural diversity they observe. Such information can be posted on the web and made available to others, constituting a sort of knowledge that has elements of the traditional (albeit of displaced persons), experiential (on the part of the youth interviewing gardeners and describing biological phenomena), and western scientific. Furthermore, the internet can be used to create platforms in which educators share what they learn through their individual programs, and thus to facilitate social and adaptive learning among a broad group of education practitioners and scholars. In the proposed workshop, we will present the application of resilience and systems theory to education at multiple levels, including teaching resilience within educational programs, and using resilience and systems theory as a way of looking at the relationship between educational programs and the broader socio-ecological system, as a means to inform pedagogical approaches, and as a cultural worldview. We hope to engage conference attendees in a discussion of the application of resilience theory to community and university educational programs, and thus to expand resilience scholarship by exploring its application to an area (education) in which not much has yet been written. The ideas presented in the workshop will draw on recent publications of the panel members focusing on systems theory, resilience, and education, several of which are listed below. We will then facilitate a discussion of the application of these ideas to education at the K-12, undergraduate, and post-graduate levels, and develop a manuscript for publication in Ecology & Society. Recent Related Publications of Panel Members Krasny, ME and KG Tidball. (in revision) Civic Ecology Education: a systems approach to Education for Sustainable Development. Environmental Education Research. Packham, R and Sriskandarajah, N. (2005). Systemic action research for postgraduate education in agriculture and rural development. Systems Research and Behavioral Science 22:119-130. Sterling, S. (2007). Riding the storm: towards a connective cultural consciousness. In: Wals, A. (Ed), Social Learning Towards a More Sustainable World, (Wagengingen, Wagengingen Academic Press), pp 63-82. Sterling, S. (2003). Whole Systems Thinking as a Basis for Paradigm Change in Education: Explorations in the Context of Sustainability. PhD Dissertation, (Bath, England, University of Bath), 477 pp. Tidball, K.G. & Krasny, M.E. (2007) From risk to resilience: What role for community greening and civic ecology in cities? In: Wals, A. (Ed), Social Learning Towards a More Sustainable World, (Wagengingen, Wagengingen Academic Press), pp.149-164.