Best Education Practice: Beyond the Community RSS Feed

See below for: research findings about how to work beyond the community – with agencies, groups, or a geographic region that may affect a specific community.

For Beyond the Community, the learning experience:

  • Builds value for education as part of policy development and implementation.
  • Builds skills for flexibility and responsiveness to environmental issues and for facilitating community engagement.
  • Offers avenues for participation which are competent, fair, and enhance involvement for all levels of responsibility.
  • Concerning a particular topic – consolidates the learning goals for all levels of responsibility, but not the teaching methods, which are adapted for the target audience.
  • Matches the target audience to the scale of the problem.

Findings Navigation: Browse by Audience; Browse by Theme; Browse by Best Education Practice; Browse by multiple topics

Margerum, R. D., & Whitall, D. (2004) Finding 1

In advising watershed councils and technical teams, provide training to enhance quality efforts in the following parameters of the collaborative process: centralization vs decentralization of the decision-making process; the tension between local/lay knowledge and expert knowledge; scale and inclusiveness of collaborative decision-making; tensions between ecological/scientific time frames and management/constituent time frames; expenses and agency resources required for collaborative decision making. Continue reading →

Lankford, B., van Koppen, B., Franks, T., & Mahoo, H. (2004) Finding 2

The complexity of the science–policy interface is a feature of integrated water resources management (IWRM) and that the norms of scientific uncertainty in the face of competing theories (held by their protagonists with greater certainty) obliges scientists to take a more active role in sensitively managing the advice-to-policy process in order to improve management of water within river basins. Continue reading →

Lankford, B., van Koppen, B., Franks, T., & Mahoo, H. (2004) Finding 1

To improve integrated water resource management by addressing existing views held by various local entities and insufficient involvement of outside researchers in local decision making process, scientists need to work on two key fronts:

  • Action research, which involves various aspects of the research spectrum; conducting studies and assessments; and resetting research questions in the light of new knowledge;
  • Action advising, which strives to encompass various dimentions of policy making, involve various groups of stakeholders and identify the influential ones, provide advice throughout the policy making process and alter advice in the light of new experience.

Continue reading →

Lamoree, G. B., Garcia, L. E., Perez, R., & Castro, E. (2005) Finding 1

Capable institutions are an essential element of effective integrated water resource management.  An institutional assessment process investigating policy, organizational and operational elements, are effective tools when designed and analyzed by stakeholders.  Assessment criteria include:

  • a decision-making capacity at the basin level that reflects the interests of different uses and users;
  • a clear and administratively detailed regulatory framework with criteria for decision making;
  • a monitoring and information system for water resources information;
  • a system that allows development and analysis of different scenarios for water use and effluent discharges;
  • effective and transparent accountability through a stakeholder participation mechanism;
  • enforcement and sanctioning power;
  • representation of water used interests and liaison with river basin management institutions;
  • effective control of service providers;
  • cost recovery by service providers and a system that allows market incentives for efficient allocation.

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Kong, S. L. (2006) Finding 1

Community-based extension and education contribute to successful community-based natural resource management among Cambodia fisheries.  The approach emphasized:

  • raising understanding among fishermen about the underlying principles of participatory democracy, ecological principles and regulatory principles of co-management;
  • nurturing, enhancing, and empowering local organizations (through participatory decision-making);
  • assisting in democratizing fishery governance at the community level to fine-tune management strategies for addressing the concerns of disadvantaged fishermen.

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Hayward, G., A. Diduck, & B. Mitchell. (2007) Finding 2

To address problems characterized by high degrees of ecological and social complexity, uncertainty and indeterminacy, as well as conflicts over values and interests; and to generate positive change in dynamic social-ecological systems, compliment public involvement processes, e.g., public comment periods, public registries, open houses, and public hearings — with a focus on inclusive and integrated efforts that can be aligned with environmental and social objectives of sustainability, and which may include such processes as visioning practices, information flows, and leadership styles. Continue reading →

Kallis, G., Videira, N., Antunes, P., Pereira, A. G., Spash, C. L., Coccossis, H. et al. (2006) Finding 1

Watershed management participatory methods include, scenario workshops (develops ideas and actions based on visioning processes), mediated modeling (problem definition, conceptualization, specification, and policy analysis), and social multicriteria evaluation (compliments decision-making processes with social science techniques including institutional analysis, interviews,questionnaires, obeservation, polls, and focus groups). Scenario workshops and mediated modeling are well-suited to the early stages of the planning process (problem solving and identification of goals and alternatives) and good at educating participants and building capacity, but not as effective at resolving long-standing conflicts and achieving consensus.  Social multicriteria evaluation is better able to address the evaluation of alternatives, reveal trade-offs, and aid convergence between divergent stakeholder’s views; however, implementation is heavily reliant on experts, and allows for less participation and deliberation than scenario workshops or mediated modeling  in the goal-setting stage.  A hybrid of participatory methods may be the best approach. Continue reading →

Ferreyra, C., & Beard, P. (2007) Finding 8

In watershed partnerships, negotiate indicators of evaluation among stakeholders. Watershed partnerships bring together multiple stakeholders with a diversity of goals, values and expectations, and each may bring different perspectives regarding what a ‘successful’ partnership entails, what type of scientific knowledge is ‘valid’, and how ‘progress’ should be measured. Continue reading →