The Green Apple Scheme A summary report of curriculum innovation projects for Education for Sustainable Development

August 2016

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About 3

Green Impact for Primary Care 4

Teacher Education for Sustainable Futures 5

Site-Specific & Immersive Performance 6

Community Engagement, Ethics and ESD 7

Embedding Sustainability Thinking into Fieldwork 7

Child-focused Research and Empowerment 8

Interdisciplinary Learning: Archaeology, Anthropology and Well-Being 8

Remembrance, Critique and Memorialisation of Conflict in the 21st Century 9

Local Learning: Sustainability Practice, Global Links, and Ethics 9

Ethics and Anatomy 10

Report compiled by

Aisling E. P. Tierney, Research Associate, August 2016

For more information on the scheme and to apply, email esd-team@bristol.ac.uk.

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The Green Apple Scheme

targets all areas of the

institution, including estates,

research, the informal and

formal curriculum.

This Education for

Sustainable Development

(ESD) small grants scheme

offers students and

academics at the University

of Bristol the opportunity to

develop projects that are

discipline specific but also

relate to ESD. Individuals

and teams can apply for

small grants from the

c.£5,000 fund for any

projects relating to taught

programmes (including

undergraduates and taught

postgraduates).

The University has based its

understanding of ESD on the

UNESCO definition which

covers four main areas:

social and economic justice;

cultural diversity; human

rights of future generations;

and the protection and

restoration of the Earth’s

ecosystems. Students should

gain an understanding of the

long- term impact they

currently have, and will have,

in their future personal and

professional life, on the

environment and how to live

within the earth’s limits.

ESD encompasses more

than just environmental

factors also including social,

economic, ethical and

cultural values. This covers

our whole system of beliefs,

values, attitudes, customs

and institution shaping our

gender, race and other social

relations, and affects the way

we perceive ourselves and

the world and how we

interact with other people

and the rest of nature.

Bids can be made by both

staff and students. The

following types of proposals

are particularly welcome:

Bids that explore how ESD

can be further embedded

within the formal curriculum

Projects that encourage

overlapping efforts between

estates, research, the

informal and formal

curriculum

Bids that include students as

co-creators of learning and

that utilise student

participation in the designing

of proposals

Bids that involve active

learning, such as community

engagement

Individual grants do not

typically exceed £1,000, but

project proposals above this

amount are considered. Each

faculty/school/department

may apply for more than one

bid. Funding may be used to

cover: releasing staff, travel,

conference fees, workshop

costs, etc.

Applications must

demonstrate how findings will

be disseminated to both

internal and external

audiences. The ESD Team

are placed to offer complete

support when writing

application bids and are

available as required

throughout completion of the

project.

Since 2014, ten projects

have been funded by the

scheme in the following

disciplines:

Centre for Academic Primary

Care

Graduate School of

Education

Department of Theatre

Department of Archaeology

and Anthropology

Centre for Comparative and

Clinical Anatomy

About

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Green Impact for Primary Care Faculty of Health Sciences - Centre for Academic Primary Care

Dr. Simon Thornton Dr. Trevor Thompson Green Impact is a change

and engagement programme

– it helps people understand

sustainability and social

responsibility, shows them

what they can do to make a

difference and supports them

in achieving these actions.

Over 400 organisations have

used the model to date,

developing and delivering

their own bespoke

programmes and

encouraging collaboration

and effective communication

of goals, successes and

challenges. Green Impact

has reached more than

100,000 people and training

over 2,500 students in

sustainability and social

responsibility. For more

information visit nus.org.uk/

greenimpact.

In 2013, NUS, the University

of Bristol and several Bristol-

based GPs started

discussing how Green

Impact could be used to

engage GP surgeries in

sustainability and social

responsibility. A specific

toolkit was developed, with

criteria that focussed on

actions that could be

completed by staff in GP

surgeries to improve

efficiency, reduce wastage

and ultimately improve the

quality of care received by

patients. The personalised

title, Green Impact for Health

(GIFH), reflects the

specialisation that has gone

into the toolkit.

The GIFH pilot aimed to:

Deliver cost savings through

more efficient use of

resources;

Deliver carbon savings

through more efficient use of

resources;

Have a positive impact on

society by: a. Creating

attitudinal and behaviour shift

in favour of more sustainable

practices among staff,

students and patients

participating in or associated

with the pilot; b. Improving

overall patient healthcare.

There is interest in the next

cycle of GIFH from practices

across Bristol, Devon,

Surrey, London, Tyne and

Wear and Derby.

Discussions are also in

progress with the Centre for

Sustainable Healthcare

about how this could be

further developed and rolled

out on a wider scale, using

the GIFH toolkit to include

sustainability in the medical

curriculum and getting

students involved in the

Green Impact process

Key performance indicators

KPI1: cost/carbon savings

from switching off key

equipment.

Communications about

switching off lights and

equipment across the 6

Pathfinder Practices has

saved up to an estimated

£2,053 and 13 tonnes of

carbon per year.

KPI2: cost/carbon savings

from more efficient paper

use.

Encouraging staff to print

double-sided across 4 of the

Pathfinder Practices has

saved up to an estimated

£2,660 and 7 tonnes of

carbon per year.

KPI3: baseline

characteristics from practices

in terms of energy spend,

referral practices, waste

spend, procurement spend,

carbon footprint.

This information was not

available a t the end of the

pilot, but wider rollouts will

aim to collect to be used as a

basis for comparison once

changes have been

implemented. Due to

seasonal variation, billing

delays etc., an annual

analysis may be advisable.

KPI4: shift from lower pro-

sustainable behaviour scores

to higher pro-sustainable

scores in individual GP staff

around specific behaviours

such as utilising active,

sustainable travel options,

turning off appliances,

recycling waste, etc.

There is statistically

significant data that provides

evidence showing a shift

from lower pro-sustainable

behaviour scores to higher

ones. The number of people

who reported doing ‘quite a

few things that are

environmentally friendly’

increased by 50% as a result

of the programme, and a

corresponding decrease in

the number that only do ‘one

or two things that are

environmentally friendly’.

KPI5: change in

percentage of staff in each

sustainability segment

Over the course of the

project, there was a

statistically significant

decrease in participants

rating themselves as

‘Cautious Participants’ or

‘Sideline Supporters’ and a

large increase in those rating

themselves as the more pro-

sustainable ‘Concerned

Consumers’. There is no

significant change at the

extremes of the scale,

although there is no evidence

that the project had any

adverse effects on attitudes.

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Teacher Education for Sustainable Futures Faculty of Social Sciences & Law - Graduate School of Education

Celia Tidmarsh

Alf Coles

Justin Dillon

Marina Gall

Kate Hawkey

Jon James

David Kerr

Janet Orchard

Jocelyn Wishart

The project aimed to bring

together stakeholders from

across the Bristol PGCE

Partnership, including

university tutors and their

colleagues, post graduate

student-teachers and school-

based colleagues, to identify

a shared agenda for

education for sustainable

development (ESD) and to

explore potential learning

opportunities within school

curricula and the PGCE

Partnership programme. It

was envisioned that the

award would lay the

foundations for a whole

course initiative in 2016-17

that features ESD within and

across school subjects.

Core Group meetings

A ‘Core Group’ of

stakeholders met on three

occasions between February

and July 2016.

Meeting 1: exploration of

meaning of ESD; discussion

of ideas for where space for

ESD exist in university and

school curriculum; subject

group discussions; plenary

discussion to share

generated ideas.

Meeting 2: feeding back on

actions undertaken including

development of website for

coordinating work; small

group discussions, settling

on actions.

Meeting 3: exploring

initiatives undertaken;

clarifying emerging themes;

identifying actions for next

year, including making

resources from this cohort

available to new students.

Learning initiatives

Subject-based and inter-

disciplinary initiatives were

trialled by teachers in

schools:

Individual subject initiatives

(in Maths, History, Science,

English).

Cross-subject initiatives

(History/Science/Geography

and RE/Citizenship).

Whole course initiative (PT

involvement – leading to

plans for an introductory ‘slot’

on 1st day and in summer

EPS).

Example – Maths and

proportional thinking

Pupils were introduced to the

World Village concept, where

the Earth’s population is

represented by one hundred

people. This provided a tool

to talk about proportional

thinking and discuss

estimates. Global data, such

as the distribution of infant

mortality in Africa and

Europe was used to plot

graphs and conduct

comparative analysis. The

project was provoked by an

existing scheme of work in

the curriculum, but one that

supported the ESD theme.

The real-world data used

enhanced the learning

experience, engaged

learners and raised

awareness of world issues.

Outcomes

The seven PGCE subject

programmes involved will

make space in the formal

curriculum to enable PGCE

students to engage in issues

around education as

sustainability. The award will

provoke greater awareness,

amongst PGCE students and

University tutors, of

pedagogies for teaching

sustainability, uncertainty

and values in schools and

the challenges of working

with 21st Century skills such

as creativity, collaboration,

critical thinking and

communication.

Hawkey, K., James, J. &

Tidmarsh, C. 2016 “Greening

the curriculum? History joins

‘the usual suspects’ in

teaching climate change”

Teaching History 162 (March

2016) The Historical

Association, p. 32-41

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Site-Specific and Immersive Performance Faculty of Arts - Department of Theatre

Kate Elswit

The award supports the

development of a third-year

option for the BA in Theatre

and Performance Studies:

“Site-Specific and Immersive

Performance.”

Site-specific and immersive

performance strategies are

increasingly prevalent in

contemporary theatre. In this

unit, students encounter

forms of site-specific

performance, such as

environmental responses to

landscape; community-

focused urban interventions;

and the staging of existing

plays within found spaces.

Students develop an

understanding of the role of

space and place with regard

to performance, which inform

their engagement with site-

specific and immersive

performance practices

beyond traditional indoors

theatre venues. These can

range from medieval theatres

in the round to contemporary

installations and flash mobs.

Students consider the ways

in which bodies, in solo and

group forms, can produce

new meanings from sites.

Site-specificity is addressed

through a combination of

historical, theoretical, and

practical approaches, such

as ecofeminist criticism and

heritage interpretation.

This project relates to several

strands of ESD.

Under the strand of cultural

heritage, performance

approaches attend not only

to preservation and

conservation of historical

sites as artefacts, but also to

their realisation and

reanimation in the present,

so that such sites can

maintain a place as a vital

part of our cultural economy.

Under the strand of

environmental limits and

ecological well being,

performance’s work with “site

-specificity” comes from a

long history of ecological

approaches that question

how landscape and

environment are revealed,

imagined, experienced,

contested, and animated in/

by/through performance. The

unit’s focus on found spaces

will shift students’ attention

beyond the indoor theatre

space towards their

attachments to and

responsibility toward the

natural world.

Under the strand of a healthy

and just society,

Performance has a long

history of relationships to non

-violent protest in support of

cultural diversity and

tolerance. The unit’s focus on

urban interventions will push

students to engage with

performance-based activist

acts and social justice within

the Bristol community (local

relevance).

The anchoring of this unit in

historical as well as

contemporary study will

demonstrate to students a

long history of the ways in

which playwrights and other

performance makers have

capitalised on the

connections between human,

society, and habitat in

important environmental and

socially aware ways. This

thus impacts on the strand of

preparing for the future, by

giving students additional

resources of the past on

which to build.

The Green Apple funds cover

professional development for

unit tutors in order to further

their knowledge and thus

student experience in these

areas.

This unit will increase

graduate understanding of

sustainability issues by

means of innovation in the

formal taught curriculum.

This unit will also feed back

into UoB ESD strategies

themselves, by expanding

understandings of the range

of ways in which Theatre and

the arts more generally can

participate in ESD training.

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A cluster of projects Faculty of Arts - Department of Archaeology & Anthropology

Community Engagement,

Ethics and ESD: Students

as Creators of Learning

Dr. Stuart Prior

Aisling Tierney

Following ten years of

research-led teaching at

Berkeley, this project aimed

to create greater dialogue

between the local community

at Berkeley and the

University of Bristol team.

The project asks students to

reflect on broad issues of

ESD and how their

archaeological work affects

the local community. It

provokes enquiry into

sustainable tourism, as the

archaeological excavations

take place within two

commercialised heritage

sites (Berkeley Castle and

the Jenner Museum and

Gardens). In the past,

Berkeley’s river was

navigable but is now

overgrown. By researching

this fact, students begin to

understand climate change

over time and how human

intervention can change the

landscape.

The processes encountered

in the project allow students

to consider future problem

solving and community

problem solving (e.g.

preventing conflicts between

University archaeologists and

the local community). And all

this learning takes place

outside the classroom,

providing a “real-world”

application of their

knowledge and skills.

Student learning and

reflection led to a one-off

event. Members of the public

were invited to attend a

festive engagement session

co-designed and co-lead with

undergraduate students.

Questions were drafted

under broad ESD areas by

students and posed

informally to members of the

public on colourful sheets,

handwritten to add to the

informality. Replies from

locals were captured when

they added their comments

using colourful post-it notes.

The public were able to meet

and chat with students,

learning from their

experiences and enthusiasm,

while our students began to

encounter the unexpected

way their month-long

excursion to Berkeley each

year affects the local society

and its economy.

Embedding Sustainability

Thinking into Fieldwork:

Placing Student Learning

at the Heart of Community

Engagement

Prof. Mark Horton

Aisling Tierney

Charlotte Goudge

In 2015, University of Bristol

(UoB) students and

graduates elected to join this

sustainability education pilot

project run in conjunction

with the Croatoan

Archaeology Society (CAS).

The project was embedded

into existing excavations at

the early contact Native

American site on Hatteras

Island, Outer Banks, North

Carolina run by the

Department of Archaeology

and Anthropology, University

of Bristol.

The sustainability education

project focused on the larger

environment, culture and

ecosystems of the region and

how they were affected by

cultural exchange and the

introduction of new

technologies from the

seventeenth century.

Students designed and

delivered a number of short

interactive learning sessions

for the local community and

school children. The former

was delivered within

community engagement

events co-organised by the

students. The latter shaped

University research learning

for a younger audience, all

within an archaeological

context involving hands-on

learning.

Through learning, reflection

and action students become

co-creators of their own

learning. The project

elevates the students

learning beyond that of a

normal field excavation

opportunity. It develops their

ability to critically reflect, to

engage appropriately with

the public, to utilise local

knowledge effectively and

allows them to explore ways

to transform their learning

into outreach outcomes. This

project serves as an example

of engaged research as it

works with the potential

users of the research, to

generate ideas and research

strategies together.

Any fieldwork, especially that

undertaken abroad, may

suffer from a lack of local

engagement. This project

addresses this problem and

provides solutions that foster

long-term local support

where local knowledge is

valued and incorporated into

academic research. By

valuing local expertise and

inviting participation, public

engagement opportunities

are enhanced.

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A cluster of projects Faculty of Arts - Department of Archaeology & Anthropology

Child-Focused Research

and Empowerment: Putting

Anthropology into Action

Dr. Sarah Winkler Reid

The workshop connected

students with Bristol children

to engage in activities that

allowed them all to explore

issues related to Education

for Sustainable development.

In the process, this would

give students a ‘taster’ of

what participant observation/

ethnographic fieldwork with

children is like in reality

(before it has been shaped

into the academically legible

form we read in the unit), and

an opportunity to apply ‘data’

to theory in the form of

assessed presentations.

Students were asked to read

some methodological

literature as well as Morelli’s

anthropological work on

Matses Children in the

Peruvian Amazon (2014).

The Matses depend on the

river for their livelihood, and

for the children (but not the

adults who prefer the forest),

it is also a source of great

fun. They learn to fish and

canoe on their own from an

early age.

Bristol students learned from

the process of transforming

theory and learning in the

classroom into practice. They

listened to the voices of

children first hand, and had

practical experience of how

particular methods maybe

used to engage with this

group. They developed their

critical thinking, practical

fieldwork, project planning

and reflective skills and

gained an opportunity to

build on this learning for their

subsequent written

assessments. Ultimately,

they experienced ESD as an

integral aspect of the unit.

Interdisciplinary Learning:

Archaeology,

Anthropology and Well-

Being

Professor Alex Bentley

Alberto Acerbi

The project delivered a

series of focused seminars

on sustainability to first-year

undergraduate students

enrolled in the BA

Anthropology unit “Well-

being and society.”

This unit examines concepts

of well-being and livelihood in

both social and global

perspective. The principal

biological and cultural

influences upon well-being

and livelihood are identified

and located in a broader

economic, social and

ecological context.

Methodologically, this unit

relates the traditional

anthropological focus upon

the local community and

small-scale society to the

wider national and

international picture of well-

being in the past as well as in

the present.

Seminar themes covered:

nutrition, environment,

populations, gender,

inequality, migration, and the

Sustainable Development

Goals (U.N.).

All students were required to

write 200-word summaries of

three different articles before

each seminar, for which they

received credit towards their

mark for the unit.

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A cluster of projects Faculty of Arts - Department of Archaeology & Anthropology

Remembrance, Critique

and Memorialisation of

Conflict in the 21st

Century: Fieldtrip and

reflective workshop using

themes of ESD

Dr. Nicholas Saunders

Emily Glass

This 2-day workshop was an

opportunity to develop a

project grounded in the multi-

disciplinary topic of Modern

Conflict Archaeology, which

also related to wider issues

within local and global ESD.

The first day comprised a

fieldtrip to the National

Memorial Arboretum in

Staffordshire which

examined the landscape,

design and context of

memorials. Students

experienced the emotional

and physical ties produced

by conflict enabling them to

gain a deeper and more

nuanced understanding of

the power and possibilities of

contemporary memorialised

spaces and add hitherto

unacknowledged

connections between

ancestors and descendants.

The second day explored

themes of ESD within

Modern Conflict

Archaeology,

Memorialisation, Landscape,

Material Culture, Memory

and Identity through a

reflective classroom critique

where students could

comprehend the subject

within localised and global

contexts.

Primarily, learning-time took

place outside of the

classroom, and as such

provided a real-world

application of their

knowledge and skill. In

addition, the students

benefited from team

discussions which enhanced

their learning and critical

reflection abilities as well as

being a great confidence

booster.

Local Learning:

Sustainability Practice,

Global Links, and Ethics

Dr. Mwenza Blell

Using an existing fieldtrip

within the anthropology

programme, students

travelled to the Exmoor

region to conduct

observational fieldwork.

Students explored places

shaped in different ways by

globalisation over the past

several hundred years to

look at comparable evidence

of sustainability practice.

They mobilised their

anthropology practice on the

ground to ask questions of

their ‘expertness’ and how

they interact with people. Key

topics investigated included

manifestations of rural

poverty versus urban

poverty, and how economic,

social and environmental

justice relate to different

places in different ways.

Following the Exmoor trip,

students visited sites across

Bristol, in the context of the

build up to Bristol European

Green Capital 2015. The

looked at Bristol’s

longstanding and ever-

evolving cultural socio-

economic diversity, taking

their learning back into the

classroom to incorporate it

into class discussions,

presentations and written

assignments.

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Ethics and Anatomy Faculty of Biomedical Sciences - Centre for Comparative and Clinical Anatomy

Sarah Gosling

Jenny McNamara

Margaret Gatumu

The human anatomy units at

the Centre for Comparative

and Clinical Anatomy

(CCCA) equip students with

a broad structural knowledge

of the human body. The

history of body donation,

anatomical exhibition and

past teaching methods are

introduced briefly and early in

the course.

This project aims to explore

these themes further, giving

the students time for

reflection in what is otherwise

a very fact-based unit. The

project will be carried out in

the first couple of weeks of

teaching block 2. At this

point, the students will be

suitably proficient in their

anatomy knowledge to be

able to make sense of the

trip, but will also have time to

apply what they have learnt

to the second half of the

academic year.

Specific emphasis will be

placed on ESD issues

including ethical approaches

to the exhibition of

anatomical specimens and

social responses to

anatomical diversity and

abnormality. Students will

travel to London to visit the

world famous Hunterian

museum. The museum

boasts an extensive

collection of ‘normal’ and

pathological examples

displayed in glass and

perspex pots, including a

vast assemblage of

embryological specimens.

The visit will begin with an

introductory tour of the

museum by the collection’s

curator, after which the

students will be given time to

explore the collection for

themselves. Although we will

be allowing each student a

chance to have their own

individual experience of the

museum, we will provide

them with a series of

questions designed to

stimulate further thought.

These will largely relate to

the ethics of the ESD issues

described above.

At the end of the day,

students will be given the

chance to reflect on their

experience in small groups.

Each group will be asked to

create a short interview-style

video relating to specific

questions on the subjects

discussed above. The videos

will be collated on a google

drive, and then collated into a

‘film’ by a member of staff.

After a few days of reflection,

the students will be invited to

attend an additional session,

where the film will be shown.

It is hoped that this will allow

the students to experience

the different opinions voiced

in just their small cohort. A

whole group discussion

about the experience will

follow.

This exercise in reflection is

an innovative addition to the

human anatomy course, and

will allow the students to gain

experience in public

speaking and group

discussion, skills key to any

future based in anatomy or

beyond.

A field trip of this sort will

provide the students with

essential skills for their future

careers, as well as

stimulating them into deep

thought and discussion of the

ethical issues faced by

anatomists in our modern

society. It will therefore

greatly enhance the impact

of Human Anatomy teaching

at the CCCA.

Aisling E. P. Tierney, Research Associate Academic Quality and Partnerships Office: Academic Registry Room 2.04, Senate House, Bristol, BS8 1TH Email a.tierney@bristol.ac.uk

bristol.ac.uk/green/doing/sustainability-courses/