Global environmental change and the poetry of place: thoughts on the education of landscape architects

Abstract

This paper discusses a range of educational issues the author believes must be addressed if we are to produce environmentally and socially responsible landscape architects to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century. The ideas discussed in this paper were first presented at the Australasian Educators in Landscape Architecture (AELA) conference held at the University of New South Wales, Australia, in March, 2000. The author suggests that as a result of growing perceptual awareness of global environmental change and degradation at the local level, public recognition of the profession of landscape architecture and its associated knowledge base may increase in the future. Growing public recognition of landscape architecture will help in efforts to move the earth towards greater sustainability and environmental health. The author stresses that educators in landscape architecture need to work towards encouraging a shift in students' thinking from an anthropocentric to a more ecocentric consciousness and that student's design work should reflect this shift. It is suggested that students be made aware that their design and planning actions at the site and local level can collectively have profound influences on the health of the entire planet. The paper also outlines the curriculum of the new Bachelor of Landscape Architecture programme (being offered for the first time in 2000 at the University of Melbourne) in which environmental issues, along with other important concerns, are being emphasised.