Bulletin

Issue: October 2006

Appointments

Leadership for outdoor and environmental education

With our sedentary lifestyle, problems of obesity and ecological catastrophes rarely off the front pages, the good news, according to Professor Noel Gough, is that studies in active areas like outdoor and environmental education are hitting the mark in terms of student interest, engagement and satisfaction.

Professor Gough: curriculum research
has been translated into Chinese.

Professor Gough – recently appointed to La Trobe University’s Foundation Chair of Outdoor and Environmental Education based at the Bendigo campus – brings a number of innovative philosophical and methodological perspectives to this new position. For example, he holds the inaugural Australian Museum Eureka Prize for Environmental Education Research, awarded in 1997, and has a wealth of experience in the internationalisation of curricula.

His work on narrative theory and poststructuralist orientations to research has informed educational research globally, and led to frequent invitations to teach in overseas universities.

A research scholar in theoretical and practical aspects of environmental education for more than 30 years, Professor Gough also heads the University’s School of Outdoor Education and Environment.

While there is already a strong interest in undergraduate courses in outdoor and environmental education, Professor Gough is contributing to new initiatives in research development and postgraduate studies, both in his School and throughout the Faculty of Education.

Professor Gough began his career as a secondary teacher. He served as lecturer in Education at Monash Teachers College, senior lecturer at Rusden State College, Associate Professor of Education at Deakin University and then Professor of Education at the University of Canberra.

Professor Gough’s other research interests include science education, popular culture, and the social and cultural effects of internationalisation and globalisation.

He is the author of Blueprints for Greening Schools, and Laboratories in Fiction: Science Education and Popular Media, and coeditor (with William Doll) of a critically acclaimed text, Curriculum Visions, which has been translated into Chinese.

He has recently co-edited a book on internationalisation and globalisation in mathematics and science education, and is currently writing a book on narrative and fiction in curriculum inquiry. He is also founding editor of Transnational Curriculum Inquiry, the journal of the International Association for the Advancement of Curriculum Studies, and serves on the editorial boards of another nine international journals.

Professor Gough says degrees in outdoor and environmental education not only provide a plethora of exciting and active employment possibilities, but also offer a broad range of academic options, with electives from philosophy to science.

‘And, of course, the studies are enjoyable, building great team and leadership skills – and leading to socially useful outcomes. ‘

For example, one third year student (in outdoor education with a sub-major in photojournalism) is involved in helping introduce alternative agriculture to Sri Lankan farmers, fishermen and relocated families affected by the tsunami.

The aim is to reduce the use of harmful pesticides in rural areas and create sustainable food and income sources for tsunami victims.