The AAEE 2014 research symposium in Hobart provided a privileged space for researchers and practitioners within environmental education and sustainability education (EE/SE) to come together and create dialogues about education for sustainability research. This essay is a critical reflection from postgraduate researchers about the symposium and the EE/SE research landscape more broadly. The authors interrogate contemporary research frameworks and practices, and deliberate on how current perceptions enable and inhibit performance within EE/SE research. The authors ask provocative questions and encourage readers to imagine for themselves what a new research landscape, freed of calcified frameworks and entrenched systems, might look like. The essay then draws on an ecological systems perspective as a means of reimagining EE/SE research within a more emergent landscape that values inclusivity, democracy, collaborative inquiry and curiosity.

Event tourism is accompanied by social, economic and environmental benefits and costs. The assessment of this form of tourism has however largely focused on the social and economic perspectives, while environmental assessments have been bound to a destination-based approach. The application of the Ecological Footprint methodology allows for these environmental assessment boundaries to be extended. This case study applies the footprint methodology to the Australian Association for Environmental Education (AAEE) Biennial Conference held in Adelaide in 2004. The results of the case study provide important insight into the planning and delivery of future events for the Association and event managers.

This study examined the effects of Sydney Water's work based environmental education program, the CARE Update, on the knowledge, attitudes, beliefs and reported behaviour of Sydney Water Customer Service Officers. A paired sample of eighty Customer Service Officers were surveyed by a combination of questionnaire and interview techniques. A comparison was made with a matched sample from the general community. Customer Service Officers who had attended the CARE Update course were more likely to support the attitudes and beliefs embodied in the New Environmental Paradigm when compared with of officers who had not attended the course and with the matched sample from the general community. However, staff who attended the course were no more knowledgeable on a number of key aspects of their job related responsibilities for environmental protection and were no more likely to report changes in their behaviours for environmental protection, either at work or at home, than were other officere who had not attended the course.

This study evaluated the current level of environmental concern amongst business school students, and attempted to determine if the personal characteristics of respondents (namely, their nationality, gender and age) were reliable predictors of scores. Two hundred students in three nations (Australia, France and Singapore) were surveyed, using a modified version of the Environmental Concern Scale originally developed by Weigel and Weigel (1978).

It was found that, in general, students displayed a relatively high level of environmental concern. However, whilst substantial differences in mean scores were not found between all three nationalities, the results did show that statistically significant differences exist between at least two countries – the Australian and Singaporean samples.

There was no statistically significant link between gender and environmental concern. However, the results did indicate a significant correlation with age, with older students displaying higher levels of environmental concern than their younger counterparts.

This paper discusses the use of an estuary monitoring toolkit Ngā Waihotanga Iho as a central part of a Māori-centred education project undertaken by Kaipara hapū (sub-tribe), Te Uri O Hau, in Northland, New Zealand. The toolkit was designed by New Zealand’s National Institute for Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA). In this project, Te Uri O Hau collaborated with NIWA and regional high schools in order to use this toolkit as a mechanism for kaitikaitanga (environmental guardianship) and Indigenous-led environmental education. This paper demonstrates that approaches such as this can be powerful vehicles for Indigenous self-determination as Māori actively undertake tribal development and environmental guardianship, and strengthen the place of Indigenous knowledge, priorities and approaches within an evolving ‘post-colonial’ education system.

Education for Sustainability (EfS) is crucial for changes in environmental behaviour (EB), and little is known about the EB of primary school teachers tasked with teaching EfS. This study sought to better understand the EB of pre-service primary science teachers. EB was qualitatively evaluated, characterising teachers’ personal environmental activism and commitment to implement EfS among pupils and their families. Data was collected via two open questionnaires based on the Johari Window (JW) and the Authentic Inner Compass (AIC) models. Both questionnaires referred to EB twice: after exposure to the JW model and via statements from the AIC model, and again after 3 months. Findings show that the JW can reveal EB, while the AIC allowed participants to enrich their descriptions of their values, needs and commitment to EB. All participants agreed it was their duty to address EfS in class, but less than half mentioned this when describing actual behaviour. This study enables in-depth understanding of participants’ EB, including their actions, barriers and concerns, which might precede planning programmes on EfS implementation. As tomorrow educators, PSTs should be the focus of such programmes, which should be part of teacher education curricula.

Attempts to model the learning process in environmental education were seriously pursued during the latter part of the 1970's (Greenall Gough 1993) and became a preoccupation with many researchers during the 1980's. This article which contributes to this body of research reports on a study undertaken between 1988 and 1994 (Mahony 1994). The project focused on a process antecedent to the above model, namely the manner by which a person comes to understand and relate to his or her environment, on the premise that a viable environmental education should be based on this foundation.

This study of an adult rural population in the Wollombi Valley of NSW, Australia, combined a contextual historical survey with a qualitative field study derived from an interpretivist paradigm. It identified four intuitive and experiential ways of knowing which constituted well defined ideologies and for which the term ‘positions’ was adopted to convey an idea of their existential and entrenched character. The positions were designated Men of the Land, Earth People, Other Agenda Folk and Unaligned Individuals.

Using drawings and accompanying written and oral explanations by third- and sixth-grade students, this phenomenological study is an examination of the children’s perception of the ideal environmental school. Analysis of the 128 features in the drawing yielded four categories: (1) physical – with natural areas and outdoor learning, (2) cognitive – core subjects and environmental ones, (3) emotional – the students’ feelings and the spaces for releasing stress and energy and (4) educational – environmental education (EE) includes a variety of pedagogies, features of nature and environmental solutions. While the drawings and explanations presented the school as the children know it, without boundary-breaking imagination and creativity, they also showed a desire for a positive school atmosphere, defined as essential to holistic EE and to leading environmental change. The positive atmosphere, nature and the environmental spaces can be the foundation of developing EE that is not fear based, which often generates helplessness and prevents action. The recommendations emphasise the need to enhance positive thinking and not to focus only on fear tactics as a means to enhance holistic EE and protect the environment.

There has been very limited progress along the pathways to sustainability sketched in my 1991 article. Some would argue we have taken several steps backwards. Environmental education is now more prepared to acknowledge the role of neoliberal global capitalism in promoting unsustainable development, and to associate sustainability with social movements and parties of the green left who urge new forms of economy and global democracy. Corporations and governments have been successful in linking education for sustainable development to ecological modernisation or light green versions of the status-quo, but in England, even the limited advance of a policy on sustainable schools under New Labour has been swept away by the present coalition government.

The creation of meaning is both intrinsic and extrinsic to environmental learning. In this paper I call attention to the process of how language practices and Imagination are important in constituting environmental meanings, as stories of the places in which we live. A concept of landshaping is introduced as a conceptual tool for thinking about the agentic construction of environmental meanings. Research data collected In north Queensland show that individual subjectivities do not necessarily align with the binary thought lines of human identity (‘us’) and nature (‘not us’) commonly reproduced within environmental education. Ideas of the natural can be problematic in environmental learning, particularly in cross-cultural education experiences. Landshaping can be used as a research strategy and as a pedagogical technique for revealing diversities and illuminating complexities in how we as individuals, and together, create environmental understandings for ourselves.

This paper outlines adult learning in the space of an important campaign against mining for coal seam gas (CSG). Recently, the government of Victoria became the first state to ban fracking for CSG in Australia. This significant legislative outcome could not have been achieved without the concerted campaigning of activists through the Lock the Gate Alliance (LTGA), in Central Gippsland. The campaign is mainly composed of circumstantial activists who have come together due to the serious threat from fracking to the quality of their land and water supply. This case study research examines adult learning in the field of a campaign. The findings from this research make clear activists learn to think critically about the environment and the impact of fracking for CSG. They learn communication skills, group work and networking skills. They develop a feel for the game of activism by learning informally through socialisation with experienced activists from the LTGA and the Environmental Non-Government Organisation Friends of the Earth (FOE). In turn, FOE resource the coalition and provide opportunities for both informal learning and nonformal learning to the protestors. Drawing on Bourdieu’s writing on practice, this paper outlines practices within the LTGA field that are influential in the knowledge and skill development of the activists.

This article begins by comparing public awareness and interest in sustainability with the views of experts in this field. Attention is then drawn to the need for people to be able to imagine their preferable futures before they can begin to work towards them. Futures workshops are cited as a means to this end and a pilot study is described which used this procedure to enable participants to identify the key elements of their desired futures. A preliminary assessment is made of the effectiveness of such a process and the saliency of sustainability in these images of preferred futures.

Problem solving and teamwork abilities are important skills for graduates entering the environment profession. Through a problem based learning approach small groups of students from the environmental courses at RMIT University have been gaining these professional skills by undertaking projects in Vietnam. With three years experience in running the project we have data, through the students' reflections and feedback, to demonstrate the value of the project approach, and to undertake improvements. Drawing on data from the latest project we can identify opportunities for improving the details of the project's organisation, but importantly demonstrate the value of the project in providing a depth of professional experiences for the students. This analysis will be important for other academics needing support in the development of project based activities for those in environmental courses.

Many teachers take students on visit to Nature Reserves or National Parks. The park management agency generally provides written information/worksheets and an accompanying ranger to provide interpretation. Rarely are these visits subjected to formal evaluation in terms of achievement of environmental education objectives related to park conservation and management values. A pilot study of a school visit of Year 9 students to Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve (ACT) found that most students had a good background in terms of previous exposure to National Parks and environmental media, and the excursion provided both an enjoyable and an educational experience. However, there seemed to be a need for basic conservation and management values and ideas to be continually emphasised to ensure their full appreciation and understanding by students.