Learning to be drier

1. Learning to be drier UB Deakin Research Team Barry Golding, Mike Brown, Annette Foley, Erica Smith Coral Campbell, Jennifer Angwin, Christine Schulz, Lauri Grace OctoberVET, October 30 2009, Ballarat

2. Learning to be Drier in the southern Murray-Darling Basin

3. Sites & teams • Alpine, Victoria: Annette Foley & Lauri Grace • Mid-river, NSW:Barry Golding & Jennifer Angwin • Lower river SA:Mike Brown & Christine Schulz • Dryland Victoria:Erica Smith & Coral Campbell

4. Learning to be drier • What is common or different about approaches to learning about being drier? • Four very different land use contexts in the southern Murray-Darling Basin. • Three different Australian states. • Interviews with education & training organisations, water authorities & land managers, farming and other enterprises, community organisations and individuals.

5. Presuppositions • A diverse range of sites (case studies), informants & interviews. • A diverse knowledge of learning about and understanding the phenomenon of drying. • Causality set aside in the interview. • A constructivist view of learning. • No right way of learning, knowing about or understanding the drying phenomenon. • Adult learning would take many forms beyond accredited education and vocational training, particularly in the community.

6. Context for the study • A decade of unprecedented dry years. • Extensive wildfires & drying of wetlands • Over-allocated water resources. • Lack of an agreed, national, Basin plan. • Water allocations approaching zero in many districts in late 2009. • Predictions of climate change causing further drying of the southern Basin.

7. Research questions • How and what do adults learn in response to changes in water availability? • How is this learning experienced & responded to by different stakeholders? • How are these stakeholders learning to respond?

8. Alpine Annette Foley & Lauri Grace

9. Mid-river Barry Golding & Jennifer Angwin

10. Lower river Mike Brown & Christine Schulz

11. Dryland Erica Smith & Coral Campbell

12. Forthcoming papers Volume of Australian Journal of Adult Learning, November 2009 • Learning to be drier in the southern Murray-Darling Basin • * Water, weeds and autumn leaves: Learning to be drier in the Alpine region • * Bearing the risk: Learning to be drier mid-river • * Learning to be drier: A case study of adult and community learning in the Australian Riverland • * Learning to be drier in dryland country • Wicked learning: Reflections on learning to be drier

13. Wicked learning Reflections on Learning to be drier UB Deakin Team

14. ‘Wicked’ (=messy) problems • multidimensionality • scientific uncertainty • value conflict and uncertainty • mistrust • urgency

15. Climate changeA ‘super wicked’ problem • time is running • there is no central authority • those seeking to solve the problem are also causing it.

16. Conclusions about … social learning, and the importance of learning… • to be productive • to be efficient • to survive • to live with uncertainty • to be sustainable • to share.

17. Conclusion • Combating the extent and effects of drying, causality aside, will require new forms of learning through new community, social and learning spaces, apart from and in addition to new technological and scientific learning.