Examining Identity and Caring in Critical Place-Based Conservation Education for Undergraduate Students

• In Event: Caring for Social-Ecological Systems through Science, Engineering, and Environmental Education: Models, Tensions, Affordances
  In Structured Poster Session: Caring for Social-Ecological Systems Through Science, Engineering, and Environmental Education: Models, Tensions, Affordances

Abstract

Purpose: The role of identity in learning, as well as motivation and disciplinary understandings, is increasingly a focus of educational research (e.g. NRC, 2012). However, there remain important questions about how to understand and study identity in ways that will contribute to increasing student thriving, achievement, and developing ethics of care of people and places. In this qualitative study we explore the role of identity and motivation amongst a group of diverse undergraduate students that participated in the Doris Duke Conservation Program (DDCSP). The program allows for students from across the United States to come together and create a “community of practice (Wenger, 1999)” that fosters interest development and identity acquisition within the broadly defined field of conservation. By positioning the conservationist identity at the center of a theoretical group of people who participate in conversation practices, we seek to explore how DCCSP, is able to transform what students perceive as the default conservationist identity. We specifically explore the role of gendered, raced, cultured, and classed identities and other student-held spaces through the design and content of the program.

Theoretical Framework/Methods: Gee’s (2005) concept of semiotic social spaces helps construct a model where conservation is a vague group of participants who share a common goal. Conservation to a low-income single mother for example, might mean using the single-stream recycling system whereas a marine biologist might focus their attention on the effects of seismic activity in our oceans. Both share a conservationist perspective while participating in two different communities of practice. In the biologist’s case, academia, creates the “principles, patterns, and procedures” that helps define the “recognizable shape” of a marine biologist (Gee, 2005, p. 219). In other words, academia defines what is accepted as a conservationist then shares that definition to the rest of the community. By giving scholars the tools to carve out a place in this subset of conservation then means teaching them the power structures that exist within and how to deal with and change them at the same time they cultivate care and collective nurturing. This not only allows for a broader view of conservation but a broader world view as well.

Results/Significance: Whether the end of their formal education or a step on their way to graduate school, undergraduates are often actively exploring future careers. Consequently, exposure to possible future selves is significant in order to persuade those still unsure about their future careers as well as ease the transition of those who see their identities tied to conservation but seem anxious about the field (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). This is especially true for students of non-dominant communities where the lack of representation in certain disciplinary fields makes imagining possible futures more difficult. Going further than simply exploring what the conservation field "is," we found that it is equally important to take a critical look at the field in general and imagine an evolved future that can better fit these students' disciplinary and personal identities towards futures defined by collective care and future making.

Authors

• Mario Guerra, Northwestern University

• Megan Bang, Northwestern University School of Education and Social Policy Learning Sciences

• Carrie T. Tzou, University of Washington - Bothell