Towards the Open Landscape Academy: Difference between revisions

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--Randy Hester, "Declaration of Interdependence," the Landscape Architecture Foundation
--Randy Hester, "Declaration of Interdependence," the Landscape Architecture Foundation


 
'''<br />What's the Open Landscape Academy (OLA) and why should you, as a student of design and planning disciplines, be part of it?'''
What's the Open Landscape Academy (OLD) and why should you, as a student of design and planning disciplines, be part of it?


Open Landscape Academy is a three part project launching in April 2023 and stretching over more than a year, including:
Open Landscape Academy is a three part project launching in April 2023 and stretching over more than a year, including:
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* Local Living Labs at several European sites where ideas, experiences and methods are tested, assessed, re-interpreted, and documented
* Local Living Labs at several European sites where ideas, experiences and methods are tested, assessed, re-interpreted, and documented


What's the Open Landscape Academy's philosophy?
'''What's the Open Landscape Academy's approach?'''
 
This is an participatory action research (PAR) project, which means that our team of instructors are also learning and experimenting in the course of the project. The basic question driving the project is how we co-create a model for democratic landscape transformations -- grounded in theory, practices of landscape democracy and participation. The goal is to prototype a model that engages academic and local knowledge, professionalism and creativity, giving privilege to the perspectives of the historically underserved communities who have not had access to landscape democracy.
 
'''What history and values inform OLA?'''
 
The OLA model builds on the experiences matured during two previous projects, Landscape Education for Democracy (LED) and its successor,  LED2LEAP projects, but is now open to a more expansive partnership to include all communities of practice involved in promoting systemic change that benefits individuals and ecosystems. The OLA instruction team have a diverse set of many different values that govern the program's methodology and content, with a few of them being:
 
* Empathy
* Openness
* Sustainability
* Resilience
* Collective creativity
* Regenerative design
* Empowerment
* Connectivity
* Empowerment
* Justice
* Equity
* Respect


This is an action research project, which means that our team of instructors are learning and experimenting as much as our students are. The basic question the project focuses on is how we co-create a model for democratic landscape transformations -- grounded in theory, practices of landscape democracy and participation. The goal is to prototype a model that engages academic and local knowledge, professionalism and creativity, giving privilege to the perspectives of the historically underserved communities who have not had access to landscape democracy.
'''What can you expect to learn from OLA?'''


The OLA model builds on the experiences matured during two previous projects, Landscape Education for Democracy (LED) and its successor, LED2LEAP projects, but is now open to a more expansive partnership to include all communities of practice involved in promoting systemic change that benefits individuals and ecosystems.
We as a team have multiple learning objectives for our students and know that due to the experimental, participatory nature of OLA, new and unexpected learning objectives will emerge in the course of the program. Here are just a few of the many topics we plan to explore within the overarching theme of landscape democracy:


The project output is threefold: it consists of an educational experience, or intensive summer workshops where the semester-long online seminar learning is tested in complex landscape change settings, and the through the year-long work of local Living Labs where ideas, experiences and methods are tested, assessed, re-interpreted, and documented.
* Systems thinking
* Power structures
* Techniques for community engagement and participation
* Right to the landscape
* Transportation justice
* Landscape storytelling
* Environmental justice
* Mapping

Revision as of 19:26, 15 March 2023


Every design action is a political act. Whose politics will we style?

--Randy Hester, "Declaration of Interdependence," the Landscape Architecture Foundation


What's the Open Landscape Academy (OLA) and why should you, as a student of design and planning disciplines, be part of it?

Open Landscape Academy is a three part project launching in April 2023 and stretching over more than a year, including:

  • A semester-long online educational seminar presented by a team of practitioners from universities and NGOs across Europe and the U.S. with presentations, discussions, and multimedia resources from around the world
  • Intensive summer onsite workshops that test what you learned in the seminar
  • Local Living Labs at several European sites where ideas, experiences and methods are tested, assessed, re-interpreted, and documented

What's the Open Landscape Academy's approach?

This is an participatory action research (PAR) project, which means that our team of instructors are also learning and experimenting in the course of the project. The basic question driving the project is how we co-create a model for democratic landscape transformations -- grounded in theory, practices of landscape democracy and participation. The goal is to prototype a model that engages academic and local knowledge, professionalism and creativity, giving privilege to the perspectives of the historically underserved communities who have not had access to landscape democracy.

What history and values inform OLA?

The OLA model builds on the experiences matured during two previous projects, Landscape Education for Democracy (LED) and its successor, LED2LEAP projects, but is now open to a more expansive partnership to include all communities of practice involved in promoting systemic change that benefits individuals and ecosystems. The OLA instruction team have a diverse set of many different values that govern the program's methodology and content, with a few of them being:

  • Empathy
  • Openness
  • Sustainability
  • Resilience
  • Collective creativity
  • Regenerative design
  • Empowerment
  • Connectivity
  • Empowerment
  • Justice
  • Equity
  • Respect

What can you expect to learn from OLA?

We as a team have multiple learning objectives for our students and know that due to the experimental, participatory nature of OLA, new and unexpected learning objectives will emerge in the course of the program. Here are just a few of the many topics we plan to explore within the overarching theme of landscape democracy:

  • Systems thinking
  • Power structures
  • Techniques for community engagement and participation
  • Right to the landscape
  • Transportation justice
  • Landscape storytelling
  • Environmental justice
  • Mapping