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Transmission teaching which centres around traditional lecturing discounts the variety of different learners and individual aptitudes. Physical Geography as a discipline has historically provided a range of teaching methods beyond lecturing which embrace field and laboratory activities, frequently adapting new research technologies to further student learning. While technological trends are increasing the demand for Geography graduates with GIS, modelling, or programming skills, Geography lecturers should remain open to using other technological advances as teaching tools. Using an example of low-cost environmental sensors, this paper demonstrates how technologically-focused exercises can effectively solidify a range of geographical skills through experiential learning. Using Kolb's Experiential Learning Model to identify the key learning processes, we compare low-cost environmental sensor training to the UK's current Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education's (QAA) Geography benchmarks. We also consider the practical applications of this technology as a learning tool for Physical Geography. In comparison with a student evaluation, this paper provides an initial basis to support additional qualitative investigations into the learning outcomes of independent, technology-based learning activities.

This paper examines the pedagogies of collaborative doctoral education. Collaborative doctoral studentships link the academy to wider societal concerns and aim to address unease about employability post-PhD. Dominant discourses of collaboration by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), and its associated research councils, give primacy to importance of knowledge exchange within doctoral education. By drawing on my own experiences of undertaking a collaborative studentship this paper articulates the benefits of a reflective pedagogical approach to collaborative studentships. This reflective pedagogy is both a way in which collective aims are potentially accomplished and an opportunity to understand more about the institutions, systems and environments in which the research relationship is embedded. This approach resonates with participatory geographies literature and this body of work can be drawn on to support collaborative students to explore the relational dynamics of the research process and reflect on the role of the university. A reflective approach highlights the importance of the relationships that are produced through collaborative research and it is by attending to these relationships that collaborative students can understand more about the inner socio-political worlds of both the academy and their non-academic partners

Debates about how best to support students' transition from school to university have re-emerged periodically since at least the 1970s. This paper focuses upon one aspect of this transition: how to develop the quantitative skills students acquire at school throughout the first year of their degree. We report on an attempt to inject pedagogic innovation into the teaching of quantitative methods to first-year geography undergraduates at a large Russell Group university in the UK. More specifically, we report on moving to a pedagogic approach of student-centred, inquiry-based learning, which uses quantitative methods to investigate the issue of air pollution. We explore whether "statistical anxiety" is still a common experience of undergraduate geographers and the extent to which pedagogical innovation can help to alleviate this. Although the focus is on UK Geography, the paper has wider relevance to anywhere geographical research methods are taught.

This commentary reflects on the key themes and goals of this symposium. It contextualizes the relationship between participatory action research (PAR) and teaching in the increasingly popular field of critical action-oriented geography. It considers a number of benefits to student learning from engagement with PAR, drawing on the papers in the collection, and raises some critical questions for future development.

This paper reviews the opportunities and challenges for re-framing the purpose, process, product and assessment of final-year geography dissertations. It argues that the academic centralities of critical thinking, analysis, evaluation, effective communication and independence must be retained, but that the traditional format limits creativity and innovation. Re-imagining capstone projects has implications for students, faculty, departments and institutions, but greater diversity could enhance its relevance to students and employers, better aligning the student experience with the academic interests and future career demands of the 21st century graduate. (Contains 2 tables.)

Emphasizes writing a dissertation in undergraduate geography study as a means of giving the student some control over subject matter. Offers criteria for selecting a topic including originality, topicality, feasibility, and likelihood of sustaining student interest. Warns that choices by academic supervisors may be made with regard to grant money rather than to interest. (DK)

This paper explores the benefits, barriers and challenges of BYOD (Bring Your Own [mobile] Device) in fieldwork teaching through the views of Higher Education practitioners who have and have not used BYOD in fieldwork. While the use of BYOD has been explored within classroom settings, there are few studies on the use and impact on BYOD in fieldwork. This study investigated the educational benefits of BYOD and the barriers and challenges associated with BYOD in the field. Students were willing to use their own devices in the field and were engaged through the use of BYOD. Practitioners noted various benefits to using BYOD, including student engagement and familiarity with their own devices, potentially increasing time available in the field. Practitioners also highlighted a number of challenges and potential challenges with BYOD including supporting a range of devices, incompatibility and the potential for inequality. This paper also explores the use of mobile technology in fieldwork through the SAMR (Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, Redefinition) model and discusses the potential for BYOD to change practice.

This paper draws on critical race theory to analyse testimonies from students that help explain why minoritised ethnic communities studying geography, planning, geology and environmental sciences in the UK, have a lesser chance of being awarded a 'good' degree (i.e. an upper second- or first-class), in comparison to White British people. There are very low levels of ethnic diversity across these subject areas. We conducted peer research, including student-led semi-structured interviews at one British university over a five-month period (involving 38 participants in total). Our analysis explores the processes of minoritisation owing to cultures of Whiteness. These relate to teaching and learning spaces, off-campus encounters, university societies, student representation/committees, social interactions, part-time employment and caring responsibilities. We conclude with a call for action to reframe and disassemble the 'degree awarding gap' through student and staff co-design of policies and actions that will not only confront, but also subvert exclusionary cultures of Whiteness in its various manifestations across university life.

This resource paper explores the benefits of developing virtual fieldtrips to help future-proof geography teaching and learning in times of uncertainty and change. Drawing on a case study from a second-year biogeography module that saw cancellations to in-person fieldtrips in the first UK COVID-19 lockdown and the development of a virtual fieldtrip by the third UK COVID-19 lockdown, we offer some insights and lessons learnt to help other academics and practitioners adopt this approach.

This paper explores the roles and relationships of emotions in the promotion of critical development geographies, as engendered through a student field trip from a university in the so-called Global North to a country in the so-called Global South. Through a case-study involving a field trip led by the authors taking Masters students from the UK to Nepal, we find that emotions are integral to the pedagogical process and critical political potential of the trip. We show how emotions are central to the connections students create with people and places during the trip, and to their learning within it, particularly around questions of positionality, privilege and power. We highlight crucial emotions of curiosity and care, demonstrating however that these do not emerge out of nowhere, but rather can be deliberately cultivated by reflective pedagogies and practices. We argue that when conducted sensitively; involving reflective pedagogies and close collaborations, field trips to the so-called Global South can promote critical learning on questions of global justice, that are in line with demands to decolonize academia, geography and development geographies specifically.

While feminist and queer pedagogic literatures can celebrate the inclusion of "other lives", and the successes of their endeavours, this paper seeks to focus on the "here" and everyday hegemonies of heterosexualities and masculinities and the "failings" inherent to teaching practices. When engaging Irish and UK students in learning about geographies of genders and sexualities teaching about hegemonies seeks to perform a political pedagogy of questioning privilege from our positionings. The teaching that I discuss is informed by student and popular presumptions about places such as Ireland and the UK as "sorted" and, indeed, "leaders" in terms of progress about sexualities (and gender identities). Such presumptions not only create specific geopolitical regimes, but have specific classroom manifestations. In this paper, I reflect on my presumed "outness" and deliberate non-namings in shared/communal spaces, extending the discussion of "here" to include how personal-institutional-national nexus create, and are created by, teaching spaces. Thus, the paper explores diverse possibilities for teaching social difference and how pedagogies are always geographically created.

The COVID-19 pandemic closed university campuses forcing rapid improvisation and adoption of online teaching. This paper explores the experience of converting three modules from proximate to online learning delivery in March and May 2020. This process was facilitated by reflective practice to support a process of improvisation as a buffering response to the pandemic. This paper distinguishes between the development of Distance Learning programmes compared to rapid adoption of online learning. Shifting to complete online teaching involves a process by which the lecturer's role transitions towards the curation of online and offline student experiences. This includes facilitating and blending extensive and intensive online learning experiences. Extensive involves the selection and curation of online learning support bundles. This requires the creation of learning roadmaps to facilitate student learning. Intensive revolves around online engagement between academics and students and takes two forms: shallow as involving a limited dialogue with students and deep which involves a co-creation process between students and lecturers. Online learning provides opportunities to adapt learning experiences in real-time. The paper evaluates the shift to online practice from the students' and academics' perspectives.

Geographical information systems (GIS) are in tune with the current ethos of higher education because of their perceived vocational value. However, it is particularly difficult to teach GIS vocationally. This paper critiques the claim of vocationalism. The authors use an innovative method of evaluating a module that enlists its alumni to reflect on the career value of their GIS teaching. The survey was analysed to show how, to what extent and for which graduates GIS had been vocationally useful. The paper concludes that GIS is vocational but in variable and complex ways for different students.

This paper is about how the transformatory pedagogical practice of popular/liberatory education can be further articulated within geography. It is based on the experiences of a third-year undergraduate course, "Autonomous Geographies", in which the author developed some of the core values of popular education, namely engaging with movements for change, making space for emotions, developing strategy and overcoming powerlessness, and building solidarity and cooperation. These were put into practice through coursework involving contact with social movements, a praxis-based reflexive journal, action planning and spokescouncils. The author reflects on how he engaged students with the possibilities of becoming active, critical and defiant citizens engaged in social change, as well as problematizing his own position and aspirations. On the author's part, this paper is a call to re-energize the links between geographical education and freedom, and a plea that we do not retreat from naming and confronting oppression. (Contains 5 figures and 8 notes.)

This paper employs academic and parable forms to evaluate critically the strengths and weaknesses, potentials and lacunae of education for sustainable development (ESD) and other sustainability-related educations. The meteoric rise to prominence of ESD is first briefly reviewed, as is the firm ground it now stands upon as an international and national educational priority. The remainder of the paper explores the shaky ground of ESD: the field's reliance on a goal, sustainable development, which, in its by-and-large continued embrace of the growth principle, is a myopic response to the Earth condition; the field's embrace of an instrumentalist conception of nature when such a conception itself feeds unsustainability; the overly skills/training orientation of ESD and its stunted engagement with a range of key aspects of the human-nature relationship; the failure of ESD to realize its original breadth and promise in its marginalization of the voice of peace, social justice, anti-discriminatory, indigenous and futures educators as well as that of sustainability educators in the South; its adoption of an anachronistic "steady state" conception of nature. Finally, it is suggested that sustainability-related education would be enriched and enlivened by fomenting a dynamic complementarity between notions of transience and sustainability.

Within the context of the internationalization of UK higher education, an increasing number of UK-based institutions are developing collaborative degree programmes with overseas institutions, of which partnerships with institutions in China are the most common. This paper employs a critical reflective approach to explore, from different perspectives (self-reflection, student feedback, our colleagues' experiences), some of the opportunities and challenges that exist for flying faculty through critical reflection on the author's own flying faculty experiences delivering an introductory Physical Geography module in China. Teaching in an unfamiliar environment brings with it a plethora of challenges, however; for staff in Geography and related disciplines, active engagement with the external world through field-based learning is perhaps the most challenging aspect of any overseas teaching experience. As such, a particular focus of this paper is on the challenges, and potential solutions, of incorporating field-based learning and teaching in the international classroom. Ultimately, faculty with international teaching experience are best placed to develop and enhance the internationalization of their own institution's curricula.

The arrival of the term Geographical Information System (GIS) in the 1960s soon created a demand for training and education in the use of this specialist hardware and software. Initially the main focus was on training people to use GIS, formal named degree programmes leading to postgraduate and undergraduate qualifications arrived later. This paper explores the changing landscape of U.K. degree level GIS education drawing on contemporary information from Higher Education Institution websites and a case study of the first single honours degree in GIS in Europe. The paper identifies a rise and fall in the number of named undergraduate "GIS" degrees since the late 1980s sandwiched between the continuation and development of postgraduate qualifications. In parallel with this trend the teaching and learning of GIS skills has emerged as a core component of undergraduate degree programmes with "Geography" in their title and in national school and degree level benchmarking statements for the discipline.

Despite emotion being recognized as fundamental to learning, the affective aspects of learning have often been side-lined in higher education. In the context of rising student wellbeing challenges, exploring ways of supporting students and their emotions in learning is increasingly significant. Pedagogic partnerships have the potential to help students to recognize and work with their emotions in their learning in a positive manner. As such, pedagogic partnerships offer opportunities to promote resilience and enhance student wellbeing. In this paper, we develop partnership research in three ways by: 1) considering the ways in which pedagogic partnership may support students to encounter emotions and empower them to develop resilience, leading to positive wellbeing; 2) exploring how this process might be achieved in the disciplinary context of geography; and 3) developing an evidence-based model to summarize the potential effect of pedagogic partnership in enhancing student wellbeing. We draw upon two case studies of student-faculty and student-student pedagogic partnership within geography curricula in order to evidence that emotional awareness in learning comes through the joys and struggles of working in partnership. We argue that pedagogic partnership may be developed to support the wellbeing of modern-day higher education communities.

In the 20 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, teaching post-socialist transition to undergraduate students has become increasingly challenging. This paper relates the development, planning and operation of a fieldwork module in Moscow, for Year Three geography undergraduates. It argues that "on-street" teaching and imaginative use of visual sources can partially overcome the linguistic drawbacks of fieldwork in this context. It supports the utility of fieldwork for teaching post-socialist transformation, but stresses the need for local knowledge and contacts, linguistic ability on the part of module staff, and careful planning, to overcome anticipated and unexpected challenges. (Contains 3 notes.)

In response to the various calls for sustainable development, a range of activities has been initiated by central and local government, business, NGOs and other institutions. In this paper, the authors focus on the important learning context of higher education. They review the agenda established at Rio and, through a critical examination of developments within the UK, comment on issues and challenges facing the sector. (Contains 2 tables.)

This paper explores the benefits and drawbacks of technology-enhanced learning (TEL) to engage undergraduate students in geography modules at Newcastle University. I consider the efficacy of "student response systems" (hereafter SRS, also known as audience response systems, clickers or personal response systems) in large lectures by experimenting with Mentimeter, an online platform designed to allow real-time response to questions. The rationale for the study is twofold: first, to respond to the swelling university enrolment which means that lectures remain a common teaching practice, and second, to reflect on the pervasive role technology plays in the everyday lives of staff and students. Bringing these two concerns together, I argue that TEL and SRS have the potential to respond to these challenges as well as to improve the overall learning and teaching experience. In order for SRS to be effective however, they need to be fully integrated into the curriculum and staffers need to be driving the usage. These arguments employ concepts of "active learning" and "contingent teaching" to better understand the usefulness of SRS to engage students in large lectures as well as how to develop a systematic approach to integrating technology into university lectures.

Increasing attention is being given to how educators might incorporate digital story-mapping into undergraduate geography teaching and assessment, with a particular focus evident on the quantitative and GIS-based values of these technologies. However, we argue that the visual elements of digital story-mapping technologies also raise questions about how students understand, organize and represent the experiences of doing qualitative research. Utilizing the concept of "digital visuality", we argue that the broader sociopolitical and cultural contexts that inform qualitative methods teaching (particularly epistemological debates about narrating embodied, "messy" research encounters) shape how students represent qualitative research in a visual form. Using empirical vignettes derived from a ArcGIS Story Map assessment at a UK tertiary institution, this paper frames story-mapping technologies as a more-than-visual form of research representation. We argue that the decisions faced by students about how to present ("can I show ethics in a picture?"), order ("I can't show that video here"), and reflect on methodological rigour ("Is it still valid data if I type-up my journal?"), stimulates important learning opportunities. Subsequently, the article is not just intended to "make-a-case" for such technology, but also to raise important questions about the digital visualities of qualitative research representation for geographical education.

Authority is one of the most problematic and ambiguous concepts in social and educational theory. Authority is a relation that is based on disparities of knowledge, expertise or experience. Drawing on teaching observations and interviews with undergraduate students and lecturers about their experiences of large-group teaching, I argue that in contrast to lecturers' focus on professional authority and expertise, many students respond most strongly to experiential forms of authority in lectures. In other words, there is a disparity between students' and educators' conceptions of pedagogic authority. Through a discussion of a teaching intervention aiming to playfully experiment with authority relations in the lecture theatre, the paper contributes to a conceptualization of an emancipatory and experimental politics of educational authority, one where students are challenged, not only to think independently, but to see their own existence -- the grounds for their actions -- as an important intellectual problem to engage with. This requires moving beyond the dominant Weberian ideal types of educational authority (traditional, rational-legal, charismatic, and charismatic-intellectual) towards a fuller understanding of experiential forms of authority.

Reflecting on a previous article, I evaluate changes encountered around teaching sexuality over the past 22 years in different geo-political settings. This article examines the ways in which my teaching practices, as an academic committed to equality, have developed in relation to different academic and political contexts. This personal pathway through learning and teaching work linked to sexuality has been, and still is, embedded within social, and feminist geography modules based on a political focus on social justice and injustice. I worked in two UK universities during the time when the Civil Partnership Act 2004 was enacted but left the UK prior to the Equality Act of 2010 and the Marriage (same sex couples) Act of 2013. I now teach in Singapore where Penal Code 377A still exists. This British colonial code criminalizes sex between consenting adult men in private or in public. This paper discusses my commitment to integrate sexuality into the curriculum and analyses the ways in which styles of delivery, content and engagement between and with students has varied across what I define as two 'eras of teaching geographies of sexuality/sexualities'.

Teaching learners with different disciplinary backgrounds, aptitudes, worldviews and cultures is an abiding problem in Higher Education. Special measures are needed to ensure that course design, teaching methods and, especially, assessment does not exclude, alienate or disinvite learners simply because they have different capabilities and ways of understanding. Most of these measures involve the radical diversification of assessment and teaching methods and, designing curricula that allow learners to reach different conclusions and learning outcomes without penalization. This paper evaluates and commends the use of Spiral Dynamics' layered system of alternative worldviews as a means of developing learner skills in critical analysis and building deeper understanding of diversity. Using Spiral Dynamics-based pluralism to guide course design fosters greater inclusion and achievement.

The paper proposes the notion of a "critical feel-trip" as a pedagogical narrative to entertain the relationships of experiential, affective and critical learning in field-based studies. It is argued that explicit mobilization of the triadic relations of these three modes of learning is a powerful way to strengthen students' appreciation of human geography's concepts and to interrogate their positionality. The paper particularly draws on a fieldcourse taught to UK undergraduates, which explores Moscow as a "field laboratory" for critical geographies. The analysis considers both effectiveness and limitations of such modes of pedagogy.

This paper offers a long-term reflection on the introduction of a photographic research project into a third-year undergraduate Human Geography module. The findings indicate that, whilst the students valued the project, it did impact on their overall performance, their evaluation of the module and the ways in which they spoke about it. The paper complements other discussions of photographic research methods in Human Geography by confirming their popularity and value to students' learning but argues that their introduction requires planning and reflection to mitigate some of the unintended consequences noted here and to maximize their benefits.

The introduction of the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) in 2016 has placed the practice and quality of teaching centre of the UK university agenda, with concerns around contact, delivery, research/teaching balance and facility support framing debates within institutions. Situating the implementation of blended learning on a year 2 cultural geography in the broader context of these discussions, this paper explores some of the challenges and opportunities this approach has in addressing some of these broader concerns, whilst improving student engagement and performance.

This paper explores peer-to-peer teaching and learning at a postgraduate level using the example of two NVivo workshops run by geography postgraduate students. The workshops took place in March and May 2011 and feedback was collected from all attendees in both sessions. This paper aims to provide a practical guide to organizing and facilitating such an informal workshop on the NVivo software for postgraduate students based on the outcomes of the two workshops. Hints and tips for others considering running similar events are provided based on the feedback received following the sessions and reflections on the organizers experiences. (Contains 2 tables and 1 figure.)

This paper explores the learning spaces associated with two geography undergraduate research journals. Wikis provide dedicated spaces for postgraduate reviewers to collaboratively develop constructive feedback to authors creating a supportive online learning environment. In becoming published authors, undergraduates reported that they gained not only academic recognition and curriculum vitae (CV) material but an ability to apply constructive criticism, a desire for more dialogue about their research and the motivation to publish further work in the future. This paper concludes that scaffolding the research writing process can be greatly enhanced by the strategic design of dialogic online learning space. (Contains 2 tables and 1 figure.)

This paper considers the possibility of overt political disagreement between human geographers and their students. Recent literature suggests that geographers should encourage their students to become more politically engaged through innovative teaching methods that could include frank discussion of the various positions taken by lecturers and students alike. Yet this same strategy could easily run against established pedagogical arguments about how teacher neutrality gives students the space to develop their views in whatever direction they choose. This paper investigates the practical management of this tension by drawing on qualitative interviews with a sample of current practitioners that centred on the occasions when personal politics have previously featured in their undergraduate teaching. It describes why overt political discussion is often squeezed out of these encounters, the careful ways in which these academics manage their political views during the times when such discussion occurs along with the degree to which they felt they should reveal them, and how students themselves commonly seemed to perform opinion in a relatively superficial way because doing so could be much less stressful. The conclusion that follows reflects on the broader implications of these findings for current debate and future practice in the discipline where it particularly emphasizes the importance of being sensitive to the interpersonal dynamics at hand.

University-community partnerships offer synergistic spaces for communities to address difficulties and universities to meet their missions. Geographers are well positioned to participate in these partnerships, owing to the discipline's integrative nature, spatial perspectives and analytic approaches, and its attention to social and environmental issues at many scales. This paper endeavours to assist geographers interested in these partnerships by illustrating three case studies of geography-community partnerships. We reflect critically on the mutual benefits from, and barriers to, these partnerships. On the basis of case studies and literature review, the paper recommends ways to enhance university-community partnerships to help dismantle the ivory tower. (Contains 1 figure and 6 notes.)

How can we find ways of training PhD students in academic practices, while reflexively analysing how academic practices are performed? The paper's answer to this question is based on evaluations from a British-Nordic master class. The paper discusses how master classes can be used to train the discursive skills required for academic discussion, commenting and reporting. Methods used in the master class are: performing and creative arts pedagogical exercises, the use of written provocations to elicit short papers, discussion group exercises, and training in reporting and in panel discussion facilitated by a meta-panel discussion. The authors argue that master classes have the potential to further develop advanced-level PhD training, especially through their emphasis on reflexive engagement in the performance of key academic skills. (Contains 7 notes and 5 figures.)

This paper looks back on the use of reflective diaries as an assessment tool in a feminist geography module over several years. It considers the ways in which reflection on practice and the valuing of the everyday could be seen as a specifically feminist pedagogic practice. It considers the alignment of module content with assessment format. The paper includes discussion of extended examples of student reflective writing and considers the practical and ethical drawbacks of using subjective modes of assessment with undergraduate geographers. (Contains 2 tables.)

Students in the mid-2010s have grown up with social media and digital research technologies. They have welfare concerns not seen in the past, and know that the workplace is changing and unpredictable as digital solutions and automation increases. A HE teachers role as a collator and interpreter of information from many library based sources into a lecture with supporting Reading List, is overtaken by the Internet making information available to everyone. This technology has potentially transformed the role of the academic, freeing up time for research, co-research and co-production of knowledge with students. Students have the tools to search and collate, to be more active learners, rather than passive receivers of information in lectures. These factors, amongst others, lead to questions about the characteristics of an appropriate and challenging geography higher education (HE) curriculum, and the teaching pedagogies which support students to be excellent in their discipline, develop critical enquiry skills alongside the skills of excellent researchers and workplace professionals. This paper seeks to identify some of these challenges and asks the reader to consider how these circumstances should influence the design of the academic curriculum and broader student experience.

Internationally, fieldwork is seen as intrinsic to geographical education. Fieldwork is here defined as any study of the environment that takes place outside the classroom. This paper extends a previous study of student perceptions of the impacts on their learning of a cancellation of fieldwork caused by an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in the UK countryside (Fuller "et al.", 2003). This paper examines the same issue from the viewpoint of the students' lecturers, who were interviewed to discover their perceptions of the value of fieldwork as a pedagogic device. Textual analyses of transcripts suggest that the lecturers' main objectives for fieldwork are to put theory into context and to teach students subject-specific skills. The development of transferable skills is a secondary benefit. Fieldwork, while considered a vital teaching and learning tool, is not central to geography and environmental science education, which emphasizes the understanding and contextualization of subject theory, but more needs to be done to integrate fieldwork into pedagogic strategies. (Contains 3 tables and 1 figure.)

This paper seeks to address assumptions on the effectiveness of fieldwork as a mode of learning in geography. This is approached from an international perspective, both in review of available evidence, which demonstrates a need for rigorous research into the issue, and in providing preliminary findings of research into the value of fieldwork from universities across three continents. Common themes to emerge concern the effectiveness of fieldwork in terms of learning and understanding of the subject: providing first-hand experience of the real world, whichever part of the world the students are in; skills development (transferable and technical); and social benefits. The extent to which fieldwork develops transferable skills depends on the context in which the fieldwork is undertaken. The paper points to avenues of future research to be investigated to deepen our understanding of the role fieldwork plays in student learning and to address the question, "how effective is fieldwork in improving learning?" (Contains 1 note.)

What might geography in "the universities" look like if geographers seriously confronted the growing dichotomy between research and teaching? This challenge goes to the heart of "the university" as a site of learning. The authors argue that the globalizing character of higher education gives urgency to re-charting the university as an environment that prioritizes co-learning as the basis for organizing educational activities in geography and potentially beyond discipline boundaries. By co-learning is meant systematic approaches to maximizing the synergies between research and teaching activities to capitalize on prior learning and experiences of all involved. The authors' argument is that feedback gained through co-learning will reshape the nature and quality of both research and teaching environments as we know them. Four methodological framings of co-learning, derived from established practice in geography, are presented, to highlight possible directions of development that are especially strategic in the current context of globalizing higher education. It is suggested that with strategies that explicitly maximize co-learning, the development of geography could occur in distinctive ways that would not happen if research and teaching were progressed in isolation. (Contains 3 notes.)

The Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) in the UK is one of the main sources of funding for postgraduate study in human geography. For some years now, the ESRC has offered funded students the opportunity to apply to undertake a short internship in a government department or with a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO). This paper provides a collective reflection from the perspective of four former postgraduates who completed different ESRC supported internships in the UK. We discuss the enhancement of writing skills for diverse audiences, the advancement of knowledge in diverse subject areas, and the opening up of employment opportunities as key benefits of participating in the ESRC internship scheme.

A principal focus in GIS higher education has been with developing curricula or accommodating new technologies to reflect the needs of the developing discipline. Pedagogy has largely reflected traditional metaphors of acquisition and transfer in the context of formal education, and this extends to preparation of students for the workplace. In this paper, the authors explore the potential for communities of practice, and in particular virtual communities of practice as a complement to more formal GIS education to provide a route to more situated, participatory learning. In so doing, the emphasis towards creating a GIS professional community of practice offers both the recognition of the role of situated knowledge in developing professional GIS expertise, and provides an important bridge from higher education to the workplace.

Strong demand for GIS and burgeoning cohorts have encouraged the delivery of GIS teaching via online distance education models. This contribution reviews a brief foray (2012-2014) into this field by the Open University, deploying open source GIS software to enable students to perform practical science investigations online. The "Remote observation" topic spanned four science disciplines in 6 weeks--an ambitious remit within an innovative overarching module. Documenting the challenges and strategies involved, this paper uses forum usage and student feedback data to derive insights into the student experience and the pitfalls and pleasures of teaching GIS at a distance.

Presents eight papers delivered at a symposium on the impact of the Dearing Report on geography instruction in the United Kingdom. The Dearing Report reviews higher education and charts the course of curriculum and instruction for the next 20 years. The papers address standards, regional applications, and criticisms. (MJP)

Argues that developing and internationalizing discipline-based networks are effective ways to develop and disseminate good practices in learning and teaching, and to promote the structures necessary for accomplishing these networks. Calls on geographers in other countries to develop educational networks and suggests that all geographical networks develop a less parochial focus. (DSK)

This paper uses case studies and secondary literature to critically examine how learning spaces inhabited by geographers might be used productively as borderland spaces for learning partnership. Borderland spaces are novel, challenging, permissive and liminal, destabilizing traditional power hierarchies. In these spaces, students gain confidence in accepting agency in learning, moving towards critical thinking and reflective judgement, thereby developing self-authorship. They acquire new knowledge, skills and facets to their identity. They also feel anxiety as they take on new roles and adopt a partnership ethos. Faculty must guide students to support their successful navigation into and out of borderland spaces.

This paper explores the effectiveness of a tutorial-based approach in supporting the development of geography undergraduates' ethical thinking. It was found that overall the intervention had a statistically significant impact on students' ethical thinking scores as assessed using a Meta-Ethical Questionnaire. The initiative led to a convergence of scores, having a bigger impact on those who had a relatively low score prior to the intervention. Interestingly, the approach had the biggest impact on students who self-identified as physical geographers. Unlike some previous research, there was little evidence of difference between male and female students.

In an era when graduate employability is a key concern, the teaching of geographical information systems (GIS) has become a subject of considerable interest. This paper reports on a study of the GIS student learning experience using student survey data from six UK geography undergraduate programmes. The findings show that although students' satisfaction levels are generally encouraging, more could be done to capitalize on the opportunities GIS offers both for the discipline and for our students. Recommendations are made for further enhancing the profile and quality of GIS pedagogy in geography curricula.

To contribute effectively to academic discourse on urban sustainability, disciplines need to think outside their silos and work together more collaboratively. Although straightforward to posit in theory, the practical realities of bringing together people with different worldviews, languages and skills can be frustrating and lead to loss of motivation. This paper presents the findings from a qualitative study of interdisciplinary team working on an urban sustainability project. Through analysis of archival materials, observations and interviews, a major theme of motivation was uncovered and explored. We conclude with some suggestions for working more effectively interdisciplinary, urban sustainability projects.

Interdisciplinary research teams and departments are seen by some as a way of addressing problems that cannot be understood using a traditionally narrow and uniform approach rooted in a particular discipline. This paper presents a postgraduate perspective by discussing the positive and negative impacts on Ph.D. research of this type of work and making recommendations for integrating students into teams containing multiple unfamiliar disciplines. These include formal discussion of opportunities and risks and following advice from those who have taken this route.

Are geography students good "environmental citizens?" Has this improved over time with increasing emphasis on sustainability within higher education? This paper compares environmental attitudes and behaviours of geography students at different stages of their degree and over a seven-year period. The findings show that although geography students have an interest in environmental issues and feel a responsibility to educate others, this does not necessarily lead to pro-environmental behaviours, particularly more indirect behaviours. Environmental citizenship attributes in first year geography students show little change over seven years, other than where behaviours have been influenced by changes to the infrastructure around them.

This paper reports findings from six field courses about student's perceptions of iPads as mobile learning devices for fieldwork. Data were collected through surveys and focus groups. The key findings suggest that the multi-tool nature of the iPads and their portability were the main strengths. Students had some concerns over the safety of the iPads in adverse weather and rugged environments, though most of these concerns were eliminated after using the devices with protective cases. Reduced connectivity was found to be one of the main challenges for mobile learning. Finally, students and practitioners views of why they used the mobile devices for fieldwork did not align.