Emergent learning outcomes from a complex learning landscape

Abstract

Institutions of higher education play an important role in training citizens who can thoughtfully and critically make decisions that impact the sustainability of our planet. While researchers have determined competencies that students need as environmental and sustainability professionals, less is understood about how to achieve these outcomes within complex learning environments, such as experiential learning settings. We apply a learning landscape framework to conceptualize connections among curricular and programmatic features and student learning outcomes on Dartmouth College’s Environmental Studies Africa Foreign Study Program. We describe the results of 31 semi-structured interviews with alumni of the program. Results demonstrate that program design and pedagogical strategies, coupled with student activities, influence both cognitive and affective student learning outcomes, and that all learning elements are mutually influencing. Further, we identify two emergent learning outcomes, appreciation for reflection and introspection and capacity to engage with complexity, identified by considering learning at a landscape scale.

Keywords:

• learning landscape
• student learning
• pedagogical strategies
• experiential learning
• reflection
• complexity

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the alumni of Dartmouth’s ENVS Africa Foreign Study Program who participated in this study, and the staff, graduate students, faculty, community partners, support staff, and generous donors who make this program possible. We would also like to thank Dr. Bridie McGreavy and our two external reviewers for their feedback on the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Table A1. Mean alumni scores on specific program learning outcomes questions.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the Paulson Family Endowment for the Department of Environmental Studies Africa Foreign Study Program at Dartmouth College.

Notes on contributors

Karen Hutchins Bieluch

Karen Hutchins Bieluch is the Practice-based Learning Specialist in the Department of Environmental Studies and a Research Associate in the Department of Biological Sciences at Dartmouth College and a research assistant professor at the University of Maine. Her research focuses on student learning outcomes and program design for environmental and sustainability training, collaboration and communication in community-university partnerships, and citizen science in natural resource management.

Alexandra Sclafani

Alexandra Sclafani has her MA in Geography from the Department of Geography, Environment & Society at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. She previously completed undergraduate studies at Dartmouth College in Environmental Studies and Geography. She is an alumna of the Environmental Studies Africa Foreign Study Program.

Douglas T. Bolger

Douglas T. Bolger is professor and chair of the Department of Environmental Studies and the Director of the Environmental Studies Africa Foreign Studies Program at Dartmouth College. He is an ecologist and conservation biologist interested in how human land-use affects animal and plant populations.

Michael Cox

Michael Cox is an associate professor of Environmental Studies in the Department of Environmental Studies and the co-director of the Environmental Studies Africa Foreign Studies Program at Dartmouth College. He is an environmental social scientist who studies environmental policy and governance, community-based natural resource management as well as path dependence and technological transitions in agricultural systems.