Growing Sustainable Mindsets

Keywords: pedagogy, campus gardens, climate action, systems thinking
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Friday
Session Start / End Time: 2/25/2022 09:40 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/25/2022 11:00 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 10

Abstract

I will present campus food growing spaces as tools for experiential sustainability pedagogies in how they foster relational identities and complex systems thinking. Work by Mirella Stroink of Lakehead University has shown that University students who are “systems thinkers” have a better understanding of complex socio-ecological systems, greater nature-connectedness, social empathy, pro-environmental values and behaviours, and ability to cope with uncertainty. I will link these traits to climate action and demonstrate the many pathways that campus gardens facilitate these benefits both via systems thinking and through direct benefits of social problem-solving in nature. Campus gardens provide students with an embodied knowing of how natural world works and act as an accessible model of complex systems. When supported by reflexive socioecological theory, food cultivation practices can reveal important ethical and social justice issues embedded in socioecolgical relations of food production and distribution. The collective mindsets and social cohesion that can develop from such practices have the potential to help students unlearn neoliberal responsibilization of the individual and reductionist identities that have misdirected our efforts for sustainable and fulfilling lives. Moreover, this social cohesion can amplify the health benefits and proenvironmental values that arise from nature interactions. I will show how these pedagogical practices can strengthen sense of place, community and self-efficacy needed for climate change adaptation. Together, we explore the synergistic effects of campus gardens spaces on both student resiliency and student capacity as sustainability leaders in the face of climate change.