Achievement

Social-ecological infrastructure systems framework for interdisciplinary study of sustainable systems: This framework is a major anchor in our IGERT program. Not only does it pull together research, it helps to organize teaching. The framework brings together infrastructure design, environmental engineering, industrial ecology, public affairs, and health and human behavior for a holistic and interdisciplinary study of sustainable city systems. The framework was fully integrated into an IGERT class for the first time in Fall 2010 and received good feedback from the students. The outcomes assessment at the end of class showed that the framework helped students to think more clearly and holistically about sustainable urban systems. Students said they learned about other disciplines and they learned what was important about their own discipline. In general the framework was valuable in the class setting to bring multiple disciplines together within the sustainable systems framework.