SERS MES students in the ‘Sustainability Applications’ class capped off a busy term with presentations to their Toronto Region Conservation Authority (TRCA) partners last week.
The TRCA 10-Year Strategic Plan, ‘Building the Living City’, outlines an ambitious strategy to improve sustainability in Canada’s economic and cultural hub. The Plan recognizes that people are part of nature, that natural systems provide irreplaceable benefits vital to our health and wellbeing, that ‘systems thinking’ can support more effective solutions, and that residents in the region deserve opportunities to influence a sustainable future. But implementing the Strategic Plan is a challenge and opens the door to many questions.
That’s where SER MES students stepped in…
Working in small groups and in close collaboration with a TRCA staff member, class participants were responsible for applying sustainability thinking to some of the key challenges being addressed by the TRCA. The process was an excellent opportunity for MES students to engage with contemporary sustainability issues in partnership with a leading organization in evidence-based sustainability practice.
Group projects included:
- Deep uncertainty and decision-making: A review for practitioners
- Frameworks and best practices to quantify ecological integrity of natural systems in the context of the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority
- Enhancing benefits from nature: A framework for assessing well-being in Toronto’s greenspace
- The climate of conversation: communication with municipal decision-makers
- Adaptive management: Connecting theory and application in the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority
Congratulations to the students, and a special thanks to all the participants from the TRCA for their active engagement on these projects.