Designing the EMBeRS Summer School: Connecting Stakeholders in Learning, Teaching and Research

Abstract

In this paper, we describe our research investigating design, teaching and learning aspects of the EMBeRS Summer School. In 2016, thirteen graduate Environmental Science students participated in a ten-day Summer School to learn about interdisciplinary approaches to researching socio-environmental systems. Using the Employing Model-Based Reasoning in Socio-Environmental Synthesis (EMBeRS) approach, students learned about wicked problems, team composition, systems thinking and modelling, stakeholder management, and communication. They applied this approach to their own research, as well as to a case study, in order to, ultimately, further the EMBeRS approach in their own institutions. Learning sciences researchers, environmental science instructors and learners collaborated in design, teaching, and learning during the 2016 Summer School in order to co-create and co-configure the tasks, social arrangements, and tools for learning, teaching and design. This paper identifies four examples of connections between the stakeholders (researchers, instructors and learners), the tools that facilitated the connection, and the implications for learning, teaching and design.