Last Friday (Nov. 5) a small group of environmentally-minded faculty met to discuss "green" classroom initiatives. We spent time talking about "paperless" courses, and wondered what truly is more environmentally-friendly: using less paper or using the technology less (or do our students have their computers on permanently anyway)? We also spent some amount of time talking about the various "paperless" platforms such as blackboard, traditional e-mail, and other tools such as "moodle" and "desire to learn" which are not largely used at SMU. We thought that perhaps more dialogue between the Continuing Education office and those who teach traditional on-campus courses could unfold, so that we might learn how to be more efficient in our desire to deliver "greener" courses. It was expressed that at present, we do not have the technology that is genuinely "green" to prompt some to go a more paperless route. Perhaps it is coming, as this article, sent to me by Tim Stretton in the History Department, discusses advances in low-power computing. We also briefly discussed e-texts, and ways to avoid unnecessary textbook selections and ways to be more innovative with publishers. I have a feeling that there will be much more to talk about on the latter in the coming months and years ahead.
It was tempting to sway the conversation into the pedagogical realm, although this meeting was intended to look at our ways of delivering green courses as opposed to the content within them. One theme that emerged that I personally want to spend some time researching and thinking about is; given the gloomy forecasts for our environment, how do we avoid turning our students off or making them cynical? Maybe some of you have thoughts on this? Both Anne Marie Dalton and I have recently returned from academic conferences related to environmental sustainability. I will be sharing some of the highlights from the conference I attended in the weeks ahead. And perhaps Anne Marie could give a guest blog on hers. So stay tuned for that as well!
In the meantime, here is another interesting resource from Anne Marie for those who are interested:
Mother Pelican is a journal on sustainable human development. It is named in honor of the Human Being that "Mother Pelican" represents. The November 2010 issue has been posted:
What is the Root Cause of Unsustainable Development?
Monday, November 8, 2010
Thursday, November 4, 2010
"How green is your classroom" reusable bag lunch tomorrow
There are several faculty signed up for tomorrow's reusable bag lunch to discuss the topic of "greening" the classroom.
The theme of our discussion is “How Green is your Course?” We will explore questions such as:
Are there specific initiatives that you take to cut down on your use of paper, energy, resources, etc. for your course?
Do you make a conscious effort to be "environmentally-friendly" in the classroom?
Is it possible to teach a paper-less course?
Join faculty from across the disciplines to informally learn from one another, and to share innovative ideas about the things that we can be doing in our classrooms. Even if you have rarely thought about being "environmentally-friendly" in your teaching, this is a great opportunity to hear what others are doing.
Date: Friday, November 5, 2010
Time: 11:30am – 12:30pm
Place: CAID Studio Classroom, AT212
I am just back from the International Greening Education Event, which was held in Karlsruhe, Germany. There, 80 participants from 30 nations talked about how faculty can more meaningfully integrate sustainability into the curriculum at institutions of higher education. I will be sharing my notes and resources from that event in the weeks ahead. But for now, we will look at our delivery of our courses regardless of content. I came across this article which explores how one group of students felt about having a paperless course. At the end of the article, there are links to a number of other studies (pdfs) that also explore whether we can really deliver paperless courses.
The theme of our discussion is “How Green is your Course?” We will explore questions such as:
Are there specific initiatives that you take to cut down on your use of paper, energy, resources, etc. for your course?
Do you make a conscious effort to be "environmentally-friendly" in the classroom?
Is it possible to teach a paper-less course?
Join faculty from across the disciplines to informally learn from one another, and to share innovative ideas about the things that we can be doing in our classrooms. Even if you have rarely thought about being "environmentally-friendly" in your teaching, this is a great opportunity to hear what others are doing.
Date: Friday, November 5, 2010
Time: 11:30am – 12:30pm
Place: CAID Studio Classroom, AT212
I am just back from the International Greening Education Event, which was held in Karlsruhe, Germany. There, 80 participants from 30 nations talked about how faculty can more meaningfully integrate sustainability into the curriculum at institutions of higher education. I will be sharing my notes and resources from that event in the weeks ahead. But for now, we will look at our delivery of our courses regardless of content. I came across this article which explores how one group of students felt about having a paperless course. At the end of the article, there are links to a number of other studies (pdfs) that also explore whether we can really deliver paperless courses.
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