Committing to place at the local scale: the potential of youth education programs for promoting community participation in regional natural resource management

R Lane, Damien Lucas, Francis Martin Vanclay, Sophie Henry, Ian Coates

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticle

    Abstract

    Emerging approaches to environmental governance require a greater level of community participation than did previous approaches in which these responsibilities largely rested with government agencies. There is consequently a need for increased engagement with NRM among a broad community sector. This paper examines initiatives by two prominent government agencies, the Murray-Darling Basin Commission (MDBC) and the National Museum of Australia (NMA), to engage school children from regional communities using education programs that focus on place and environmental health. We focus on the MDBC's International Riverhealth Conference held in Mildura in 2003 and the associated Murray-Darling Basin TalkBack Classroom sponsored by the NMA and the Parliamentary Education Office (PEO). We explore how key themes of local scale, place-based identities, youth voice and critical engagement are developed in these programs and consider how they relate to the environmental agency of children. We then reflect on the potential for the kinds of environmental agency promoted through these programs to help build the capacity of local communities to progress larger goals of environmental restoration and sustainability in the Murray-Darling Basin. The evaluation research reported here forms part of the Committing to Place research project, an Australian Research Council Linkage grant involving the University of Tasmania, the National Museum of Australia and the Murray-Darling Basin Commission.
    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)351-367
    JournalAustralian Geographer
    Volume36
    Issue number3
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2005

    Fingerprint

    Dive into the research topics of 'Committing to place at the local scale: the potential of youth education programs for promoting community participation in regional natural resource management'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

    Cite this