Joint conference of ECLAS and UNISCAPE 2019

Hosted by the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Ås Norway, September 16-17, 2019

Lessons from the past, visions for the future: Celebrating one hundred years of landscape architecture education in Europe

Real change can only happen very slowly and as a result of education.
Edward Said, 1993

Education is imperative to safeguard change for a better future; change is inherent to landscape and future oriented thinking is embedded in landscape thinking. The first academic education program in landscape architecture in Europe began at the then Agricultural University of Norway in 1919, today the Norwegian University of Life Sciences in Ås, Norway. One hundred years onwards, the relatively new discipline of landscape architecture has an opportunity to embrace lessons from the past to project, imagine and envision better futures.

By reflecting on how landscape architecture education has evolved, developed and adapted to critical environmental and societal needs, and how it can go forward in facing contemporary challenges, the discipline moves to the centre of architectural and environmental discourses as the profession best equipped to make the kinds of links necessary for sustainable practice.

This conference will host thought-provoking discussions, intellectual deliberations, and the sharing of cutting-edge ideas, knowledge and innovation about landscape as a core topic and the role of educators of the future generations of landscape practitioners, researchers and scholars. Two published edited volumes on teaching landscape architecture, The Routledge Handbook of Teaching Landscape Architecture and The Studio Experience will be launched at this conference. This centennial celebration is also an opportunity to launch a new Master of Landscape Architecture in Global Sustainability at the Faculty of Landscape and Society in the Norwegian University of Life Sciences.

We therefore invite conference presentations relating to education in landscape in general (UNISCAPE and other landscape networks) and education in landscape architecture in particular (ECLAS). These include paper presentations, organized plenary sessions, organized workshops and posters associated with education. Submissions will present reflections and experiences on education regarding three main umbrella themes: Curricula, Pedagogy and Research and in the spirit of their subthemes posted below. These subthemes presented as questions are in no way exhaustive, and the scientific committee is open to further suggestions. Nonetheless, presentations should all relate to landscape education whether as a core topic or as reflections on, for example, how can particular research or practice contribute or be influenced to/by education.

CURRICULA

¤ History of landscape education

–              What evolutions and revolutions in teaching traditions in landscape architecture can be identified?

–              How have transformations in technology — from pencil to Photoshop, from hand drawn perspectives to computerized visualisations, from Mc Harg’s graphic overlay methods to GIS and more — contributed to pedagogy?

–              What have historically been the challenges and opportunities of different didactic methods in landscape architecture?

¤ Digital and E teaching

–              Experiences and reflections from the E classes: How has technology been employed to achieve pedagogic goals in landscape architecture?

–              What evaluation methods have been developed to assess the benefits and opportunities to teach landscape architecture in this manner?

¤ Theory in landscape architecture

–              What theory in landscape architecture do we teach and why?

–              What is its relevance of theory in a vocational and artistic/creative discipline such as bachelor degrees in landscape architecture?

–              What are the didactic methods used for integrating theory into a design project.

¤ Landscape Ethics

–              What are the ethical dimensions that we address in teaching landscape architecture?

–              How do we attend to professional ethics, environmental ethics and the relevant human and social values?

¤ Assessment and programme development

–              What are the tools to assess on going relevancy of curricula?

–              How has curricula been adjusted to contemporary challenges?

–              What is the relationship between professional and academic associations (e.g. ECLAS, IFLA, National Associations of landscape architects); how much do they influence and monitor programme development and curricula? How has their guidance been implemented?

 

RESEARCH

¤ Research in Landscape architecture

–              What are the particularities of teaching research in landscape architecture and how are they addressed? How do we teach research skills?

–              What types of pedagogic challenges supervision of theses and dissertations pose? what methods are found appropriate to address these?

¤ The European Landscape Convention and landscape education

–              How is the European Landscape Convention shaping landscape studies in general and landscape architecture professional education in particular?

–              What theories and methods are used in landscape education to the public?

 

PEDAGOGY

¤ Pedagogic methods

–              What specific methods have been developed for teaching topics such as: critical thinking; creative thinking; aesthetic understandings; addressing landscape complexity; landscape analysis and other landscape architecture related skills?

–              How has studio teaching evolved and what innovations in design pedagogy are identified?

¤ Teaching landscape architecture in a global context

–              How are contemporary grand environmental and societal challenges being addressed in landscape education?

–              How is landscape management within a context of climate change attended to in education?

¤ Pedagogy and multicultural landscapes

–              How is landscape education responding to a growing population cultural diversity?

–              How does this affect approaches to teaching design of urban and rural environments across Europe?

¤ Teaching transdisciplinary approaches to landscape

–              How is the wide landscape knowledge base required to support the discipline, incorporated into landscape architecture education? (e.g. human geography, social sciences, architecture, soil sciences and geology, ecology, environmental studies, art, legal studies, city and open space planning, and more).

 

Submissions are invited for the following four categories:

  1. Paper presentation

Requirements:

  • Title (max. 20 words)
  • Keywords (up to five)
  • Extended abstract 800-1200 words + references in APA style
  • A 100 word biography of author(s)

Above information submit at: http://openconf.eclas.org/author/submit.php   Deadline: 10 December 2018

Optional: a max. of 3 figures. Please upload figures separately in a zip file (no larger than 20MB) at http://openconf.eclas.org/author/upload.php

To authors whose abstracts have been provisionally accepted by the conference scientific committee: please revise your abstract according to the reviewers’ comments. Resubmit your abstract at: http://openconf.eclas.org/author/edit.php  Please mark ‘REVISED’ at the beginning of your submission title. Deadline: 15 March 2019

If you were not requested to revise, please make sure you mark ‘FINAL’ at the beginning of your submission title.

  1. Proposal to organise a thematic session, call for session conveners

Requirements:

  • Title (max. 20 words)
  • Keywords (up to five)
  • Thematic proposal 700 – 900 words
  • A 100 word biography of each convener, discussant and presenter

Conveners are responsible to approach scholars of their choice to submit a paper. Conveners will review (or send to relevant reviewers) the papers, and invite a discussant who would have in advance read a 3000-word paper of the presenter, so she/he can lead a meaningful discussion. Conveners will collaborate with the scientific committee.

Please upload a detailed proposal describing context, theme, objectives, main questions for discussion, expected outcomes, key references etc.

Please suggest 2-4 speakers for each session; where appropriate suitable presentation proposals that had responded to the general CfP might be suggested by the scientific committee to be included in your session.

Submit at: http://openconf.eclas.org/author/submit.php  Deadline: 10 December 2018

 

To authors whose proposals have been provisionally accepted by the conference scientific committee: Please prepare a 300 word summary description of your session, which will be published on the conference website and included in the printed proceedings. Please send your summary description no later than 15 March 2019 to shelley.egoz@nmbu.no and copy to lei.gao@nmbu.no.

  1. Proposal for a thematic workshop (90 minute session/s)

Requirements:

  • Title (max. 20 words)
  • Keywords (up to five)
  • Detailed workshop proposal 600 – 800 words
  • A 100 word biography of each organiser

The proposal should describe the purpose, methods/approach and time frame of the workshop including any required preparation from potential participants. Participants will be asked to register for workshops in advance. Please also include the following information in the proposal:

  • Min-max number of participants
  • What can the participants expect to gain from the workshop/ Why should people attend this workshop?
  • What facilities would you like the conference organisers to provide?
  • Duration of workshop: Would you like to apply for one or two 90-minute sessions?

 

Conclusions from the workshops will be published on the ECLAS website after the conference.

Workshops that are innovative and reflective are in particular encouraged.

Submit at: http://openconf.eclas.org/author/submit.php   Deadline: 10 December 2018

To authors whose proposals have been provisionally accepted by the conference scientific committee: Please prepare a 300 word summary description of your workshop, in which you advertise your workshop to make it attractive to conference participants. We will post the workshop descriptions on the conference site in due course, and ask potential participants to register in advance. The summary descriptions will also be included in the printed proceedings. Please send your summary description no later than 15 March 2019 to shelley.egoz@nmbu.no and copy to lei.gao@nmbu.no.

  1. Posters

We welcome posters on landscape education.

Requirements:

  • Title (max. 20 words)
  • Keywords (up to five)
  • Abstract (100-150 words)
  • A 100 word biography of author(s)

Above information submit at: http://openconf.eclas.org/author/submit.php   Deadline: 10 December 2018

 

Required technical specifications:

A0 size (841 x 1189 mm) in landscape format,

or

A1 size (841 x 594 mm) in portrait format.

 

Guidelines for posters:

For legibility, please be selective and strategic regarding the information conveyed.

Consider the following:

  • People have a limited time to look at and read posters
  • All text must be easily readable from a distance of 1 to 2 metres. We recommend 24-28pt fonts for main text, and at least 48pt font for the title of the poster
  • Use as many graphic contents such as diagrams as appropriate, avoid long texts. The content should be clear and attractive but not too gimmicky
  • Upload your poster(s) in a zip file

Once your poster is accepted by the scientific committee, please prepare two prints to bring along to the conference. Information on where to submit hard copy posters will be advertised in due time.

Upload poster (in a zip file, no larger than 20MB) at http://openconf.eclas.org/author/upload.php   Deadline: 10 December 2018

To authors whose posters are provisionally accepted by the conference scientific committee: please make the FINAL version of your poster(s) in a zip file no larger than 20 MB, entitled ‘FINAL_your ID number’, and upload to: http://openconf.eclas.org/author/upload.php  Deadline: 15 March 2019

 

 

Criteria for acceptance of submissions

A) Relevancy to landscape education whether it is in an academic or community context. Nonetheless this does not limit presentations only to research revolving around pure pedagogics; any landscape topic could be addressed in the context of how it relates to education of future researchers and practitioners through reflections, insights and discussions on the presented topic.

B) Interest and quality

The proposal describes an intellectually rigorous presentation that shows promise to offer new knowledge, insights and stimulate robust discussion.

C) Commitment to attending the conference

At least one of the authors has completed registration and paid the conference fee by 15 March 2019.

 

Scientific committee NMBU

Shelley Egoz, chair

Lei Gao

Anne Katrine Geelmuyden

Karsten Jørgensen

Assisted by ECLAS and UNISCAPE network reviewers

 

Any questions please contact

shelley.egoz@nmbu.no