This course explores how museums, galleries and cultural heritage settings embrace the spirit and underpinning philosophy of Sustainability and it investigates their pivotal role in enacting and championing sustainable development in practice. The course examines how museum and heritage institutions might foster and narrate harmonious relationships between people, place and planet and how they can embed environmental, climate and social justice into their professional identities and educational practice

A blend of synchronous on-campus seminars and synchronous field-study visits at museum/heritage settings

■ 8 x 2 hour seminars on campus

■ 4 hours of field visits

None

N/A

Part 1 (50%) Creative Design Project

Equivalent to 2,000 words

Title:  Creative Learning Design

Design an innovative, original learning experience that champions sustainability for a chosen audience in a museum, gallery or heritage setting .

Part  (50%) Critical Rationale

2,000 words equivalent

Title: Justifying and Critiquing Successful Sustainability Planning Practice

A critical commentary that justifies the design features of PART 1, referencing practice to theory, literature and policy.

Through theoretical inquiry, policy analysis and applied design work, this course provides students the opportunity to develop detailed, critical knowledge and understanding of how sustainability can move from principle to practice in the Museum and Heritage Education sector.

 The course aims to:

■ Develop students' critical and advanced understanding of sustainability theories, concepts and debates relevant to museum and heritage education, exploring how sustainability can be translated from principle into educational practice

■ Foster informed and critical engagement with national and international policy frameworks, sector discourses and contemporary challenges that shape sustainable approaches within diverse museum and heritage contexts

■ Provide opportunities for students to investigate and interpret culturally responsive, environmentally conscious and place-based educational practices through reflective, reflexive and field-based inquiry

■ Support students in the design and justification of creative, inclusive and ethically informed museum and heritage learning experiences that promote sustainability, community engagement and responsibility towards people, place, planet, peace and prosperity.

By the end of this course students will be able to:

1. Critically evaluate the theoretical, philosophical and conceptual foundations of sustainability in relation to museum and heritage education to justify the role of museums, galleries and heritage settings as ethical and inclusive agents of environmental and social change.

2. Analyse national and international policy and professional sector discourses relating to sustainable development to evidence a critical understanding of how museum and heritage contexts engage with contemporary global challenges (eg. climate change, sustainability and environmental justice)

3. Use reflective and reflexive rigour to interpret culturally-responsive, environmentally conscious and place-based educational practices, drawing on pedagogical perspectives that support sustainable and socially-just engagement in museum settings.

4. Demonstrate a critically reflective, inclusive and ethically informed approach to museum and heritage education professional practice, integrating principles of care, community engagement and sustainability

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.