Field Ecology: A Modest, but Imaginable, Contestation of Neoliberal Science Education

UNCG Author/Contributor (non-UNCG co-authors, if there are any, appear on document)
Aerin Workman Benavides (Creator)
Heidi B. Carlone, Associate Professor (Creator)
Wayne Journell, Assistant Professor (Creator)
Catherine E. Matthews, Professor (Creator)
Institution
The University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG )
Web Site: http://library.uncg.edu/

Abstract: Science education has become a valuable market tool, serving the knowledge economy and technocratic workforce that celebrates individualism, meritocracy, entrepreneurship, rational thought, and abstract knowledge. Field ecology, however, could be a modest, but imaginable contestation of market-driven neoliberal ideology. We explored diverse high school youths’ meaning making of a summer field ecology research experience. Youths’ narratives, elicited with a modified card sort and qualitative interviews, highlight the cognitive, social, emotional, and physical aspects of learning demonstrating considerably broader views of knowledge, meanings of the natural world and their place within it, and access to scientific practices than implied by neoliberalism.

Additional Information

Publication
Mind, Culture, & Activity 23, no.3 (2016): 199-211.
Language: English
Date: 2016
Keywords
science education, field ecology, youth, high school, neoliberal ideology

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