DOI
10.1080/1389224X.2014.927377

Summary
This paper is concerned with the adaptation of an outcome-based education development process to address near real-time sustainable agriculture challenges. The primary issue addressed in this paper with regards to agricultural challenges is the volumes of pesticides that are lost to surface water bodies, whilst maintaining crop yield. Halbleib & Jepson state that ‘education, combined with access to new technologies, provides a key mechanism for enabling sustainable and adaptive crop management that also protects human health and the environment’. To address some of the challenges associated with sustainable agriculture, the authors have adapted an Outcome-based Education (OBE) instructional design method. OBE was developed in the U.S in the 1990’s to enhance grade school education methods. In this case the OBE was adapted specifically for the teaching of new skills in pest management risks. The adapted OBE contains seven clear steps:

Identify education and decision support needs
Jointly envision locally specific intended outcomes
Develop learning guides
Create a Process Map
Design interactive learning and decision support tool development
Support active learning
Evaluate and adjust

Table 2 presents a case where by two example projects were subject to the adapted OBE method and describes the process through the seven steps.

Figure 1 is a visual representation of feedback loops that lead to desired outcomes of sustainable agriculture.

Halbleib & Jepson designed a pre-test and follow up survey for selected farmers. They covered the key issues in pre and post survey/tests to enable a comparison scenario for the assessment of the adapted OBE. The post evaluation was designed to answer two key questions (1) What changes in skills do participants attribute to the course? And (2) Did the skills gained and applied in their work indicate progress towards the intended outcomes?

The results are discussed in length in the discussion section. Figure 2 depicts some of the successful uptake of measures and skills for farmers reducing the impact for pesticide use on freshwater bodies.

Relevance for Complex Systems Knowledge
This study is relevant to the sustainable development topic. It contributes to the literature of sustainable agriculture challenges education with a focus on farmer education for the reduction of pesticide pollution events.

Halbleib & Jepson offer an adapted version of the OBE system which may be useful for furthering the higher education curricula of this method.. OBE is useful for: providing students with a group process view of the system they are learning, enhances cohesive and active learning and creates an environment based off feedback between developmental and implementation stages of a programme. The fact that Halbleib & Jepson successfully adapted the OBE to suit the studies needs shows that it may be possible to replicate this adaptation for a similar study regarding complex systems in sustainable development.

 

Point of Strength
The paper strongly aligns with the reimagining of higher education. The OBE approach allows students or stakeholders to interact with the moving parts of a challenge system and encourages group workings in the development of solutions.

The paper provides useful tables in the main body of the text as well as the appendix. These may be used as examples if the study were to be replicated.

Figure 1 provides a visual representation of feedback loops for the studies intended outcomes.

OBE, under this existing or newly adapted method, may be used for similar or different education fields.