International Collaborative Research Possibilities for Environmental Education in Asia

Abstract

Taking into account of the both significant growth of higher education in Asia and the infiltration of cosmopolitan viewpoints in environmental education research, our team designed and conducted pilot survey amongst EE researchers of Japan, Korea and Taiwan (n=51) concerning: self-evaluation; methodology; training; themes; education sector levels and interests in and barriers against international collaboration. This paper shares notable trends revealed through the pilot survey and discuss the significance of these in relation to our future, full-scale survey. Toward conducting a larger-scale survey, two aspects should be stressed. First, use of native language is essential to securing greater participants. This would improve the accuracy of meaning sometimes lost through translation and increase the efficiency of completion. More survey participants would enable us to conduct crossnational comparisons, which this study could not. Second, the support from the participating academic societies is crucial not only for executing a full-scale survey but also facilitating opportunities for increasing research skills and capacities international collaboration.

Understanding Barriers to Participation in Environmental Education Conferences among Environmental Education Society Members in Asia

“…To investigate the barriers for participation in EE conferences, a 22-question survey was developed and administered for anonymous participation through Survey Monkey from September 1, 2020 -December 1, 2020. Based on the research of To et al (2019), to assist the respondents' understanding of the questions and to increase participation, the survey was developed in English, Japanese, Chinese, and Korean. The survey consists of one question to identify the participant's preferred language from the four translations, one informed consent question, five demographic questions, nine questions about domestic and international EE conference participation without considering COVID-19, and six questions regarding the impact of COVID-19 on the participants' research and likelihood of participating in future in-person and virtual EE conferences.…”

“…The survey consists of one question to identify the participant's preferred language from the four translations, one informed consent question, five demographic questions, nine questions about domestic and international EE conference participation without considering COVID-19, and six questions regarding the impact of COVID-19 on the participants' research and likelihood of participating in future in-person and virtual EE conferences. Following the advice from To et al (2019) about seeking support from the academic societies, we contacted each society mentioned in Section II, with varying levels of response. Those societies that responded and were willing to send the survey distributed the survey link through direct email to society members.…”

“…These collaborations, with an initial focus on East Asia, reflect the desire to expand the impact of studies of environmental education from Asia to a greater regional and global audience . To et al (2019) demonstrated that 96% of their survey participants indicated interest in international collaborative research. Sakurai and Furihata (2019) discuss an approach to create international environmental education research collaborations through the publishing of a special journal edition using, as Ninomiya-Lim et al ( 2017) stated, English as the common language.…”

“…They go on to focus their discussion on how the research needs to be inclusive to all and provide a forum for discussion about all aspects of environmental education research, including perspectives that dissent from the mainstream, if the EE field is to grow as a collective of colleagues and researchers. Research by To et al (2019) indicates that half of their survey respondents have a great interest in "sharing information about the latest research findings" (p. 82). This sharing of findings frequently starts at conferences.…”