A VALUES FRAMEWORK FOR STUDENTS TO DEVELOP THOUGHTFUL ATTITUDES ABOUT CITIZENSHIP AND STEWARDSHIP

In most introductory geoscience courses students learn scientific ways of understanding and the practical benefits of the natural world. To further develop skills of citizenship and stewardship, students need to develop a more nuanced understanding of the ways in which people perceive, interact with, and value the natural world. We have adapted a values framework (Stephen Kellert, “The Value of Life,” Island Press, 1996) that includes utilitarian and scientific/ecologistic values, as well as naturalistic, aesthetic, humanistic, moralistic, symbolic, dominionistic, negativistic, and theistic values. This poster explores how students are introduced to and apply the values framework in two introductory courses for non-science majors.

In an interdisciplinary environmental course, students accept that economic benefit – the utilitarian value – is important in guiding human decisions about the natural world. The values framework helps students also see “hidden” values; they commonly don't recognize the importance of controlling nature (dominionistic value) in technological societies. Kellert's values provide counterbalance and alternatives to the prevailing economic viewpoint. For example, students understand cost-benefit analysis to justify resource development. However, people living near the resource may argue that the inherent sanctity of the land and ecosystem (moralistic value), the beauty of the land (aesthetic value), or the connection of their community with the land/ecosystem (humanistic value) must be accounted for and may outweigh economic benefits.

The goals for a course on volcanoes include essential citizenship abilities: to understand the world from the perspective of another person or culture, and to make decisions and act upon incomplete and uncertain information. Most students begin the course asking, “why would anyone live near a volcano?” Kellert's values provide a vocabulary and schema to analyze attitudes of people living with geological hazards as expressed in readings and videos. Students also use the values framework to evaluate the effectiveness of hazard mitigation and evacuation strategies. In a final essay, students express how working with the values framework deepens their understanding of human responses to the natural world and its hazards.