Research Questions

How has Situational Analysis (Clarke, 2003, 2005, Clarke et al, 2018) be used in environmental education research with secondary school pupils in Scotland and Austria?

What opportunities and challenges are experienced in using this research approach in environmental education research?

Objectives

To demonstrate the use of Situational Analysis (SA) in complimentary case studies across two European countries.

To identify and describe the common and diverging experiences of this methodological approach in relation to environmental education research.

Overview

Young people are taking increasingly public and overtly political action in response to environmental concerns. Schools can play a central role in eco-citizenship and climate change education supporting young people in navigating current environmental challenges. However, the capacity for schools to do this is inconsistent and often inadequate. Following a new-materialist approach, two examples of environmental education programmes are explored here to show how schools can be transformative places.  

The first of these projects, based in Austria, is the research-education-cooperation k.i.d.Z.21_aCtiOn2. This researchprovides a new perspective to these debates by collaborating with high school students on the climate-friendly transformations of their schools, thus connecting quality education (SDG4) and climate action (SDG13) (United Nations, 2015). Supported by interdisciplinary researchers, the school students assessed and tried to reduce the CO₂ emissions of their schools. The second project, based predominantly in Scotland, involved explores how environmental citizen science can contribute to lived eco-citizenship experiences for young people while they are in formal schooling. A major finding was that environmental citizen science experiences offers opportunities to connect pupils with scientific research practices in a way that offers authentic citizenship opportunities not ordinarily available in schools.

Both of these research projects utilised Situational Analysis (Clarke, 2003, 2005, Clarke et al, 2018) as their major analytic method. Situational Analysis (SA) uses cartographic techniques to explore and analyse the research situation. Three main mapping approaches are used;

1. situational (messy and relational) maps that lay out the major human, nonhuman, discursive, and other elements in the research situation of concern and provoke analyses of relations among them;

2. social worlds/arenas maps that lay out the collective actors, key nonhuman elements, and the arena(s) of commitment within which they are engaged in ongoing negotiations, or meso level interpretations of the situation; and

3. positional maps that lay out the major positions taken, and not taken, in the data vis-à-vis particular discursive axes of variation and difference, concern, and controversy surrounding complicated issues in the situation.

(Clarke, 2003, p. 554)

The intention of these maps is to bring out the complexities, to subject the research situation to a rich and deep analysis that includes the human and non-human actors present in, and impacting upon, the intention of the research (Clarke, 2003). Clarke (2005) describes the use of this cartographic approach as a break with the traditional researchers’ ways of working, thereby generating unique insights into the situation. This approach was deemed to be appropriate when uncovering and understanding the complexity of environmental education programmes situated within formal school settings. The particular attention given to the more-than-human elements of the situation was attractive in attending to the relational and spatial complexities generated in these complementary research projects situated in different European countries.

This comparative case study brings together experiences of utilising SA in two different settings with secondary school pupils. These projects have been the subject of ongoing discussion and comparison aiming to discern common and diverging experiences in the application of this research approach. The k.i.d.Z.21¬_aCtiOn2 approach collected persons, sources of emissions, discussions, more-than-human aspects and processes that have to be considered for climate-friendly transformations. Creating situational maps of changing contexts, the mapping had to be supplemented with features hinting at motivators, barriers and changes. Besides present actors, groups and topics, the situational maps include retrospectives as well as outlooks. Although Situational Analysis was often applied to rather stable situations, situational maps could be of decisive importance in achieving changes. In the case of k.i.d.Z.21_aCtiOn2, situational mapping enabled the researchers and students to confront, visualise and analyse complexities and barriers associated with climate-friendly transformations instead of trying to negate them (Clarke, 2004, p. 555). Through a particular interest in young people’s perception of climate change, related experiences and the aspects they deem important when trying to create more climate-friendly schools, the situational mapping mostly depicts their interpretation of the situation. This was further promoted through the Situational Analysis partly being applied as an educational method. In addition to its common use as a research method, we introduced it into the project k.i.d.Z.21_aCtiOn2 as a tool for the participating students to visualise and better understand relevant aspects to the assessment and reduction of CO2 emissions in their schools. In the Scottish case, situational maps were generated by the researcher in response to a series of data collection events focused on the lived experience of pupils participating in citizen science activities through their secondary school science or geography classes. Participant observations, survey responses and focus group discussions contributed to multiple iterations of maps enabling a visual representation of the situation to be produced and interrogated. Following each data collection exercise, messy and relational maps were constructed. This visual representation of the situation opened up the complexity and messiness, enabling multiple perspectives to be considered. Different elements of the map were expanded or collapsed as the analysis proceeded, illuminating the visible and invisible relationships between element of the research situation. Bringing these complimentary cases together has enabled the researchers to compare experiences and draw out some of the challenges inherent in this complex research approach, these will be described in our presentation.

Converging experiences SA supported understanding the development of eco-citizenship and climate action as it is highly suited to understanding complex (wicked) problems. The open, flexible nature of the approach resulted in the identification of situated knowledge. In both projects, the attunement to the more-than-human opened meaningful directions of research focus. The synergy between this analytical approach and new-materialist sensitivities is one which is particularly relevant to environmental education research. The process of working with the relational maps was intuitive and rigorous, however, the social worlds and positional maps proved to be a little more challenging. Like den Outer et al (2013) and Mills et al (2006), we found constructing the positional maps particularly challenging. The ‘positions’ of interest in the data were not immediately clear, it took time and a consistent re-turning to the data to identify and articulate the relationships that warranted further exploration across both projects. Diverging experiences The three types of map, but the situational map most clearly, as created by the researcher is a reflection of their specific view at that moment. Changing time or researchers will produce a different map(s), which reflects the changing landscape and alternative journey that might be seen by an alternative perspective. In each project, the role of the young people in map production was different. In the k.i.d.Z.21_aCtiOn2 the pupils were directly involved in producing relational maps with the support of the researchers. Practical challenges and a lack of familiarity with the approach limited the contribution that some pupils made to these maps. In the Scottish case, the young people were not involved in map production at all. This is a significant consideration for future practice. Drawing together these experiences, recommendations for the future use of SA in environmental education research with young people will be made in our presentation.

Clarke, A.E. (2003) Situational analyses: Grounded theory mapping after the postmodern turn. Symbolic interaction, 26 (4), pp. 553-576. Clarke, A. E. (2005) Situational analysis: Grounded theory after the postmodern turn. Sage Clarke, A., Friese, C. and Washburn, R. (2018) Situational Analysis Grounded Theory After the Interpretive Turn 2nd ed. California: Sage.