Experience and Understanding
Living and Experiencing Sustainable Urban Design During Study Abroad: The University of Georgia’s Freiburg Study Abroad Program View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Heide Crawford
In this paper, I show the impact of study abroad when it exposes students to sustainable living options. I created the Freiburg Study Abroad program in 2011 and have been the on-site Director ever since. My goal with this program has been to provide students with the experience of living in a city that has been a model of sustainable urban design for decades. Students experience everyday life in the “Green City” of Freiburg, Germany as they learn German at the Goethe Institute, take public transportation, walk or ride bikes, walk to the local grocery store, separate and recycle trash in their rooms, live without air conditioning in the summer, and so on. Simply this manner of living has had a profound impact on our US American students, because it is vastly different from the automobile-centered life they are used to. We also participate in tours of local sustainable living communities in Freiburg (Rieselfeld and Vauban), so students can see different successful models of sustainable urban design. As a final project, students research and pitch an idea to the local power company for a Sustainable Urban Design project that is sensible and beneficial for Freiburg and worthwhile for investors and the company. By doing this, students are able to show that they not only understand various sustainable urban design technologies, but also how they can benefit a city and its citizens, making it truly sustainable. One student credited this program with her decision to pursue a career in Eco-Finance.
Visualizing the Climate Crisis: Graphic Design as a Tool to Incite Environmental Awareness, Empathy, and Response View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Kelly Salchow MacArthur
As the impacts of climate change are presently and alarmingly obvious, eco-activism through design visualizes concepts and incites change. Armed with the powerful tools of visual communication, urgent responsibility rests on the shoulders of designers to prioritize critical messages through clear and inspiring messages for the public. Design can serve as the conduit between science and society, abstraction and clarity, and singular work and collaborative systemic effort. My teaching, research and practice over the past 17 years has explored various communication design strategies—humanistic appeals to reconnect oneself with nature, disturbing statistics meant to instigate response, logical calls to action, aesthetic presentation of biophilia, visualization through concrete poetry, community mapping in partnership with an ecological organization, making through green processes and foraged materials, etc. The body of work varies in method, message, and material—yet maintains the commonality of environmental principles and goals of resilience. Design thinking and creative problem solving can and should aid humankind’s response to the climate crisis. Presenting this arc of environmentally focused creative research aspires to demonstrate benefits and impact, while instigating future cross disciplinary collaboration and cooperation. As an eco-activist designer, I hope to contribute to (and sway) the ongoing dialog of environmental urgency that is often met with inaction.
Flood That Never Subsides View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Teody San Andres
Several parts of the city of Malolos, towns of Hagonoy, Paombong and Calumpit in the province of Bulacan are perpetually flooded throughout the year being built on a delta environment. The province is located between the coastal areas and the base of the Sierra Madre Mountain ranges where illegal quarries and loggings occur. The flood and swamping are one of the effects of the changing climate in the area. This paper aims to elucidate major issues concerning inundation in the affected localities and the possibility to deal with it. Mixed methods research are utilized to gain a more complete and comprehensive results of the problem. Archival research, focus group discussion and face-to-face interview were also applied. The preliminary results show that there are possibilities on how to find solutions and solve the flood problems in low-lying areas that affect the socio-economic status of the people.
