Placed-based Pedagogy Teaching Certification
The Place-based, Community-engaged Teaching Certification prepares faculty across disciplines to teach courses or components of courses using place-based pedagogy that also engages and amplifies the work of community partners focused on economic development, health services, education access, resource conservation and management and leadership in all spaces and places.
This certification represents a partnership between the OHIO Place-based Initiative and the CTLA. It arises from the experience of Place-based Initiative Director Michelle O'Malley's whose students in her Ecology of Leadership course visit Grand Teton National Park and consider disruption, resilience, succession and adaptation in nature and how those concepts translate to human spaces and teaching and learning.
Participants in this deep professional learning opportunity will be able to disconnect and adventure while considering innovative and creative pedogogical design in their courses.
Place-based Certification Outcomes
- articulate differentiating characteristics of place-based pedagogy and its relevance to their respective disciplines
- deepen appreciation for place-based pedagogy and the necessity for community engagement resulting from an immersive experience on site and with community leaders, educators and developers
- develop curricular content, modeled on that of the teaching certification course, for courses to be offered at OHIO, in Athens and across the Regional Higher Education ecosystem, as well as via Study Away/Study Abroad programming which elevates Place and each citizen's role in support of Place.
Certification Requirements
- Completion of Place-based, Community-engaged Teaching Certification course at Teton Science Schools, in Jackson, WY (10 days) during the summer.
- Submission to University Curriculum Council and CTLA of course or course component redesign.
- Submission of reflection (written or multi-media) on experience to CTLA.
- Presentation (poster, technical talk, other) at the annual OHIO Place-based/Community-Engaged Symposium.
Summer 2025 Location: Murie Ranch, Grand Teton National Park
The summer 2025 professional development session will take place June 19 to 30, 2025, on the Murie Ranch inside Grand Teton National Park and at a site that is stewarded by collaborating colleagues at the Teton Science Schools (TSS).
On-site Activities
Participants will work with the professional learning team at the Teton Science Schools while exploring pedagogies that support community and deeply knowing/engaging with Place.
They will also have the opportunity to experience the Tetons, the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and the community of Jackson Hole in much the same way Ecology of Leadership students do.
Participants will hike, journal, read/discuss/reflect AND build out new courses (or components of courses) for implement in the fall 2025 or spring 2026 semester and share at the upcoming Place-based symposium.