School of Sustainability Graduate Culminating Experiences
Student capstone and applied projects from ASU's School of Sustainability.
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- All Subjects: community development
- All Subjects: transformation
Description
The current global food system is not designed to support local populations. It is a complex network of technologies and behaviors that optimize production and distribution, but simultaneously interact to result in many of the sustainability challenges that we face today, particularly when it comes to food insecurity within communities and the resulting health dynamics. Current frameworks intended to guide outside entities working with communities in Maricopa County are generally insufficient to empower these communities to sustainably develop and manage their own local food systems. Many protocols are designed for effective interventions, but community organizers often lack effective pre-community engagement strategies and fail to get target participants to show up to meetings. Primarily, existing protocols and frameworks overly emphasize problems at the expense of identifying what assets the community has to be able to address challenges from within.
For the community engagement piece of the project, existing community engagement protocols and frameworks were compared. The most effective strategies were then selected and combined into a single adaptive framework. Assets Based Community Development, the Sustainable Neighborhood for Happiness Index, and the six types of capital are used as the foundational structure of the Community System Map. A Community Food System map was then organized using a “hub” approach, and the Residential Edible Landscaping map was organized based off of field experience. The nested systems illustrate just how complex the community food system really is. The outcome of the project is the first iteration of an adaptive tool that can be used by for-profit or non-profit organizations to co-create and interdependently manage local community food systems.
For the community engagement piece of the project, existing community engagement protocols and frameworks were compared. The most effective strategies were then selected and combined into a single adaptive framework. Assets Based Community Development, the Sustainable Neighborhood for Happiness Index, and the six types of capital are used as the foundational structure of the Community System Map. A Community Food System map was then organized using a “hub” approach, and the Residential Edible Landscaping map was organized based off of field experience. The nested systems illustrate just how complex the community food system really is. The outcome of the project is the first iteration of an adaptive tool that can be used by for-profit or non-profit organizations to co-create and interdependently manage local community food systems.
ContributorsTibbetts, Jason (Contributor)
Created2019-05-15
Description
Eating meat leads to several environmental threats, hence reducing one’s consumption can be a direct way to avoid environmental degradation. While sustainability scientists know about the environmental degradation due to meat consumption, many of them still choose to eat meat. It is questionable whether a broader societal transformation towards sustainable consumption is likely if people with the necessary knowledge and values already struggle and fail to implement a sustainable behavior. How can they expect others to change if they do not change themselves? This paper addresses the knowledge-action gap that is prevalent among sustainability scientists regarding their meat consumption and how they deal with it. Qualitative semi-structured interviews and thematic content analysis are applied to analyze the main internal barriers to pro environmental behavior sustainability scientists face as well as what narratives and rationalizations they use to overcome the dissonance between their knowledge and actions. The internal barriers they demonstrated were emotional non-involvement and a perceived lack of power of the individual. The strategies used to overcome the dissonance were conscious consumption narratives and rationalizing the value of meat consumption, specifically its perceived sustainable dimensions. This paper also highlights that sustainability scientists do feel responsible to lead by example in the context of societal transformation, but do not always follow through with behavior change. This study concludes it is necessary that sustainability scientists do so more consequently to embrace their role as trendsetters and change agents for a sustainable transformation.
ContributorsFalkenstein, Anna (Author) / Upham, Paul (Contributor) / DesRoches, Tyler (Contributor) / von Wehrden, Henrik (Contributor)
Created2018-07-02
Description
In universities, such as Arizona State, students are becoming homeless at an alarming rate. These homeless ASU students are often invisible, as seen through the lack of information on who they are and what resources the university has developed to help them. Typically, students arrive at university campuses with most of the resources required for them to pursue a degree. However, several economic factors such as unemployment or financial instability can impact these resources which influence students ability to stay enrolled in classes. This feature is reflected in the well understood concept of the starving student. Despite this paradigm, the fact remains that students under this stress are attending classes and are under financial stress to do so while being unable to meet their basic needs. These intertwined elements result in ASU students becoming exposed to cyclical needs-insecurities including homelessness.
Therefore, the team decided to develop a project called Sun Devils Together which addresses the needs of ASUs students facing homelessness and overall aims to help increase the accessibility of available resources through reducing the silo effect that occurs due to lack of communication between different departments and increases faculty, staff, and student awareness regarding the issue. In order to achieve this, the team has collaborated with the Assistant Dean of Students to produce a training module for ASU faculty, professional staff, and students. The team is contributing information to the creation of a new website that will have all the resources available to students in one place. In addition, the team will create a coded pamphlet with a map of resources that will be given out to different departments around campus that students may potentially reach out to for help while informing those departments regarding the existence of other departments that work towards the same cause.
Therefore, the team decided to develop a project called Sun Devils Together which addresses the needs of ASUs students facing homelessness and overall aims to help increase the accessibility of available resources through reducing the silo effect that occurs due to lack of communication between different departments and increases faculty, staff, and student awareness regarding the issue. In order to achieve this, the team has collaborated with the Assistant Dean of Students to produce a training module for ASU faculty, professional staff, and students. The team is contributing information to the creation of a new website that will have all the resources available to students in one place. In addition, the team will create a coded pamphlet with a map of resources that will be given out to different departments around campus that students may potentially reach out to for help while informing those departments regarding the existence of other departments that work towards the same cause.
ContributorsAbdul Rashid, Maryam (Writer of accompanying material) / Dosier, Skyliana (Writer of accompanying material) / Sanchez Marquez, Omar (Writer of accompanying material)
Created2020-05-13
Description
While we often see community gardens as material spaces managed by organizations, resources and institutional arrangements do not fully define a community garden or ensure its success. Understanding the “human factor” is key to implementing interventions at the subjective level that allow gardens to thrive. The Escalante Community Garden in Tempe, Arizona is a transforming social-ecological system wherein volunteers exhibiting collective efficacy are a crucial component. To keep this undergoing transformation on a positive pathway, I leveraged a sustainability intervention, a Transformation Lab, using a set of replicable participatory tools to support personal and interpersonal dynamics beyond an organizational perspective.
ContributorsHalter, Marley (Author) / Manuel-Navarrete, David (Contributor) / Cloutier, Scott (Contributor) / Eakin, Hallie (Contributor)
Created2018-04-19