Built Environment Education Across Boundaries. The Case of Energy Retrofit As a Tool for Low Carbon Transition

Abstract

Since the 1990s, several studies have focused on the concept of Transformative Pedagogy as a strategy to foster inter-disciplinary abilities to rise to the challenge of sustainable development. Although the impact of these transformative pedagogies is widely recognized, their integration in traditional educational programmes is often neglected, specifically in programmes that develop future practitioners in the built environment(BE).In this realm,research has promoted the integration across disciplines as key element to build locally appropriate technological solutions to deal with energy issues that building and urban scales. However,the lack of inter-disciplinary training and tools necessary to support the understanding of complex problems within an inter-disciplinary context has remained an issue. This project deals with this lacuna by developing an innovative learning platform for knowledge integration in Energy Retrofit(ER).This paper starts with an overview of the methodological approach,which was used to configure the main structure of the cognitive tool (i.e., cmapER). Then, the results of the workshop which involved twelve senior researchers with different backgrounds (e.g. economists, architects, planners, engineers and project managers) in a mutual process of knowledge exchange, are presented. The main findings point out a set of new functionalities and properties of the CmapER as a cognitive tool that canstimulateinterdisciplinaryperspectivesinER.Thiscontributionrepresentsafurther development on the combined use of cognitive mapping technique and meaningful learning activities in the realm of BE disciplines.

Exploring transformative pedagogies for built environment disciplines: the case of interdisciplinarity in low carbon transition

“…The method that was used to develop the cognitive structure was described elsewhere (Sibilla and Kurul, 2020;Sibilla and Kurul, 2019) and is out of the scope of this paper. Primary data for testing the pedagogical approach was collected through workshops, which were conducted over a five-month period.…”