Training Future Actors in the Food System: a new collaborative cross-institutional, interdisciplinary training programme for students

TY - JOUR

T1 - Training Future Actors in the Food System

T2 - a new collaborative cross-institutional, interdisciplinary training programme for students

AU - Reed, Kelly

AU - Collier, Rosemary

AU - White, Rebecca

AU - Wells, Rebecca

AU - Ingram, John

AU - Haesler, Barbara

AU - Caraher, Martin

AU - Lang, Tim

AU - Arnall, Alex

AU - Ajates Gonzalez, Raquel

AU - Pope, Harley

AU - Blake, Lauren

AU - Sykes, Roger

N1 - The IFSTAL Programme is funded under the Catalyst Fund from the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE). It is co-funded by the collaborating institutions both in-kind and in cash. Ethics approval for the on-line survey was given on the 18 May 2016 by the Central University Research Ethics Committee, University of Oxford, reference number SOGE 1A-69.

PY - 2017/4/30

Y1 - 2017/4/30

N2 - There is an urgent need to train a cohort of professionals who can address and resolve the increasing number of fundamental failings in the global food system. The solutions to these systemic failings go far beyond the production of food, and are embedded within broad political, economic, business, social, cultural and environmental contexts. The challenge of developing efficient, socially acceptable and sustainable food systems that meet the demands of a growing global population can only be tackled through an interdisciplinary systems approach that integrates social, economic and environmental dimensions. The new crossinstitutional training programme, IFSTAL (Innovative Food Systems Teaching and Learning), is designed to improve post-graduate level knowledge and understanding of food systems from a much broader interdisciplinary perspective, which can be applied to students’ own studies. Ultimately, these graduates should be equipped to apply critical interdisciplinary systems thinking in the workplace to understand how problems are connected, their root causes and where critical leverage points might be. This article outlines the programme and presents a review of its first year (2015-2016 academic year).

AB - There is an urgent need to train a cohort of professionals who can address and resolve the increasing number of fundamental failings in the global food system. The solutions to these systemic failings go far beyond the production of food, and are embedded within broad political, economic, business, social, cultural and environmental contexts. The challenge of developing efficient, socially acceptable and sustainable food systems that meet the demands of a growing global population can only be tackled through an interdisciplinary systems approach that integrates social, economic and environmental dimensions. The new crossinstitutional training programme, IFSTAL (Innovative Food Systems Teaching and Learning), is designed to improve post-graduate level knowledge and understanding of food systems from a much broader interdisciplinary perspective, which can be applied to students’ own studies. Ultimately, these graduates should be equipped to apply critical interdisciplinary systems thinking in the workplace to understand how problems are connected, their root causes and where critical leverage points might be. This article outlines the programme and presents a review of its first year (2015-2016 academic year).

KW - Food security

KW - Systems thinking

KW - Virtual learning envionment

KW - Pedagogy

U2 - 10.31273/eirj.v4i2.161

DO - 10.31273/eirj.v4i2.161

M3 - Article

VL - 4

SP - 201

EP - 218

JO - Exchanges: The Interdisciplinary Research Journal

JF - Exchanges: The Interdisciplinary Research Journal

IS - 2

ER -