Читать книгу The Wiley Handbook of Sustainability in Higher Education Learning and Teaching - Группа авторов - Страница 24

We used a single, holistic, descriptive case study (Yin 2003) focusing on the SSH to describe an instance of sustainable student living as a potential example of activist learning. Given that using on‐campus housing for activist learning is relatively unique, the case can be considered a revelatory case (Yin 2003). We draw on two main sources of information for our analysis: interviews with students who were residents in the bungalow and reflections from the authors who have been closely involved in the project.

The interviews were carried out in 2012 with five students, two of whom were involved in setting up the project and lived in the house in the first year of the project (2010–2011), and three who lived in the house in the second year of the project (2011–2012).

We (the authors) have relevant reflections, having worked with the SSH in a professional capacity. Robinson was one of the Course Directors that supported students in their interactions with the university when initially securing access to the house, and in working with the early years of the project. She has also led research and dissemination related to the project and advised and supported the Project Officers who became more closely involved in the project. As a result of her role in the project and as teacher to students on the undergraduate sustainability course, she was able to observe both students' learning associated with the SSH and how the project was perceived by academic, operational, and student support staff.

Laycock Pedersen supported managing the SSH as a Sustainability Project Officer between 2013 and 2015. This mainly included supporting students with gardening activities, organizing tours of the house, and helping with the transition between groups of housemates. She conducted her doctoral research about student‐led food growing projects that focused on a related project (see Laycock Pedersen 2019), which meant that the SSH came up in some interviews she conducted. While these interviews were not analyzed for this chapter, they provided depth of understanding into the project.

Between 2014 and 2017, Briggs was a student of the sustainability‐focused undergraduate program that gave rise to the SSH. She did not live in the SSH during her studies; however, she was engaged in SSH activities, such as gardening and social events. Following her studies, she became a university‐employed Sustainability Project Officer (her current role at the time of writing). In this new role, she has supported the SSH through acting as a first point of contact for students living in the house, advising and supporting students on projects they want to lead during their tenancy, facilitating network‐building between students and professional services teams, including grounds, the energy manager and university communications teams, and supporting housemate participation in sustainability events. From her time as a student and as a Sustainability Project Officer, she has gained insights into the project as a peer to the housemates and highly involved staff member. This meant she has been privy to aspects of living in the SSH that the housemates would be unlikely to share with academic staff.

As an authorial team, we offer complementary perspectives, having been involved in the project in different capacities and at different times. We interpreted the interviews and our own reflections through the lens of scholarship about service learning (and related areas), adult activist learning, and education for sustainability.