permaculture

[Victor Guest <vic@daena.eepo.com.au>]

COURSE POST SAEd-Share-L (Holistic Management)

This post contains a syllabus of a course in the broad category of
agricultural and food system sustainable development. This syllabus is
mainly available on the Web, but this post contains the background
information that is presented to students.

SAEd-Share-L welcomes additional contributions of similar courses at any
type of higher educational setting to share with other educators.

Regards,

Nancy Grudens-Schuck, list manager, SAEd-Share-L

>+>+>+>+>+>+>+>+>+>+>+>+

Educator:                       Dr. R.H. (Dick) Richardson

Course Title:                  "Natural Resource Management" at URL:
                                http://www.utexas.edu/courses/resource

Level:                          Graduate and undergraduate


Institution:                    Zoology Department, University of Texas,
                                Austin, Texas, 78712, U.S.A.
                                Phone: (512) 471-9651;
                                E-mail: d.richardson@mail.utexas.edu

>Language:                      English

Date of First Post:             September 29, 1997
>
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Dear SAEd subscribers:

This course is really worth a look on the Web at URL:

http://www.utexas.edu/courses/resource

where it is available for use by Dick Richardson's students in this course
on Natural Resource Managment.  Dick is a long time SAEd-Subscrdiber. He
has not only based his course on Holistic Management (TM) ideas, but
provides his students with experiential learning opportunties like
structured group work, structured self-reflection and assessment, and
interesting case studies. Dick once told me that his course does not have
'agriculture' in the title, but is 'all about' sustainable agriculture, and
I could not agree more.

I have provided the text from only one of Dick's Web sites so that you may
see some of the content. However, you will learn more about Dick's
organization and goals if you visit the several Web pages that he has
created for the course. These Web pages do more than simply provide text to
students: Dick says that the Web is an integral part of the course. He
teaches the course in the spring so the Web pages may undergo some change
from this time until the course begins again.

Regards,

Nancy GS

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>
>                        Natural Resource Management
>                                Dick Richardson
>
>BACKGROUND
>
>Natural Resource Management involves two courses, one at the undergraduate
>level (Zoology 470C), and the other at the graduate level (Zoology 384L).
>They are combined in order to take advantage of having two levels of
>student
>expertise working together. A similar team composition is common in the
>"real world" of business or government or non-governmental agencies (NGOs).
>The graduate students will have an opportunity to use their advanced
>training in their specialty and in environmental sciences, and they will
>refine their technical skills in leading a team to accomplish one or more
>objectives, publication of a report. They will learn, and lead a team, in a
>holistic decision process to reach the project objectives. The
>undergraduates are expected to have modest or advanced technical knowledge
>in biology and environmental sciences, but are expected to be inexperienced
>in the application of this knowledge in management. In most cases, neither
>graduate nor undergraduate students are expected to have experience working
>in a team and making decisions holistically. Outside of academic circles,
>team work is the norm, and requires a different set of skills, whether one
>is the leader or a member of the team. For individuals who prefer to work
>alone, team work is not only possible, but often depends upon such people t=
o
>"go away" for a while and finish a task and return to interface with the
>rest of the team. Teamwork does not mean exclusively working "in the same
>harness" but working in a coordinated way to accomplish a specified
>objective.
>
>All students will begin managing natural resources with their own lives. A
>simple measure, their ecological footprint, will be calculated and
>periodically evaluated by each individual. The general implications will be
>a backdrop for all activities in the course.
>
>                                 OBJECTIVES
>
>Objectives are similar in graduate and undergraduate courses, but some
>differences apply since the graduate students will be Team Leaders. The
>objectives apply to three areas, Teamwork, Management Procedures, and
>Consensus Building. Each team will develop the objectives for their project
>that employ the research skills and scientific foundations.
>
>Management Procedures
>
>Both graduate and undergraduate students will be expected to accomplish the
>following:
>
>  1. Calculate a personal "Ecological Footprint" and determine ways to
>     reduce the area of land that is needed to provide the natural resource=
s
>     for personal existence.
>  2. Describe how their personal decisions are made, and organize this
>     procedure into a "decision making flow-chart".
>  3. Draft a holistic goal for oneself, or collaboratively for one's
>     immediate family, identify the "whole" that is affected by and utilize=
d
>     in personal decisions, and begin to make holistic decisions in
>     day-to-day activities.
>  4. Draft a holistic goal for different management units in a variety of
>     circumstances (supplied as exercises) and involving different people i=
n
>     order to compare holistic decisions to those made using a "conventiona=
l
>     decision process".
>  5. Contribute to team objectives in the analysis of decision making
>     processes of a cooperating organization that "hosts" the team, and
>     suggest how holistic decisions would differ from existing decisions.
>  6. Write a term report with their team on their project, which will be
>     "published" on the web site for the course, and, if of excellent
>     quality will be submitted for peer review for formal publication in an
>     electronic journal. (The completion of a formal publication will exten=
d
>     beyond the end of the class, and will not be part of the class grade.)
>
>Teamwork
>
>An undergraduate student will be expected to accomplish the following:
>
>  1. Identify their optimum role(s) in a team that utilizes their skills an=
d
>     knowledge to compliment other members of their team to accomplish one
>     or more objectives.
>  2. Take responsibility to work with leader and team members to monitor an=
d
>     improve team effectiveness in reaching the objective(s).
>  3. Participate in a team with high personal commitment to maximize the
>     team's effectiveness.
>  4. Apply knowledge from courses and experience and take initiative to
>     gather other information or obtain skills as needed to accomplish the
>     team's objective(s).
>  5. Carry out responsibilities as a team member, with a commitment to high
>     quality work completed "on time". This includes preparing parts of the
>     final report in a form that are clearly written, accurate, and
>     contribute to successful completion of the team's objectives. (Only
>     those willing to carry through to publication will be included on the
>     list of authors, should the team report qualify for submission for
>     formal publication.)
>
>A graduate student will be expected to accomplish the following:
>
>  1. Identify the strengths of team members, and organize these in an
>     effective way to accomplish one or more objectives.
>  2. Build the collaborative dynamics in a team, serving as a catalyst for
>     members feeling they are valuable members with pride in the success of
>     the team.
>  3. Facilitate and instruct the team in the consensus building process, an=
d
>     guide the decisions using the holistic management decision making
>     process.
>  4. Organize the initial plan to accomplish the objectives, and then
>     facilitate adaptive improvements with the contributions from the team
>     throughout the team's work schedule. (This may mean any degree of
>     revising the plan, provided the revisions produce a better plan.
>     Adaptations to changing circumstances, new information, or other
>     "corrections" in objectives or strategies are part of holistic
>     management.)
>  5. Organize the writing of the report that presents the team's results
>     that accomplish the objective(s) or revised objectives, and take the
>     lead in blending results into a document suitable for formal
>     publication.
>
>Consensus Building
>
>Both graduate and undergraduate students will be expected to accomplish the
>following:
>
>  1. Describe and characterize the differences between working with
>     "collaboration" and working with "consensus." (These will be discussed
>     in class.)
>  2. Facilitate and skillfully participate in groups to create
>     consensus-based actions.
>  3. Show how groups functioning with consensus and using the holistic
>     decision making process can effectively manage natural resources in
>     sustainable, or even regenerative, ways. When such a result is deemed
>     impossible, then a student will identify the restrictions that prevent
>     such management.
>
>Maintained by Dick Richardson
>d.richardson@mail.utexas.edu
>Last updated 02/17/97: Copyright=A9 1997 R. H. Richardson.
>
>End syllabus

***************************
Nancy Grudens Schuck
Doctoral Candidate

Department of Education
119 Kennedy Hall
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York 14853
U.S.A.

E-mail: ng13@cornell.edu
=46AX: (607) 255-7905

***************************