Conference Contribution Details
Mandatory Fields
McInerney, Chris
Social Policy Association Annual Conference, UK
Teaching public and social policy through PBL and Civic Engagement
Lincoln, UK
International Refereed Conference
2011
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Optional Fields
04-JUL-11
06-JUL-11

This paper describes the development of an innovative teaching method to enable students of political science and social policy to develop a deeper comprehension of public and social policy concerns through engaging with real world scenarios.  In this case, the public policy concern in question involved the development of a local area plan as part of the Irish Government’s National Spatial Strategy. The paper outlines how the development of a Constructivist Learning Environment (CLE) (Jonassen, 1999) was fashioned by integrating a Problem Based Learning (PBL) approach within a postgraduate public policy module with a University wide, interdisciplinary initiative, the UL Practicum. The latter being was designed to facilitate meaningful and mutually beneficial engagement between the University of Limerick and local communities.  In particular, the paper describes the process by which students were exposed to the complexities of public participation in policy making, not least the challenges of engaging with individuals and groups that experience poverty and social exclusion.  As part of this, students were involved in fostering a series of external partnerships with local authority officials, elected representatives and a number of civil society organisations, highlighting for students the complexities of public policy making within a multi level, new governance environment. 

 The paper illustrates the potential to enhance student learning, develop multi layered problem solving capacities and create platforms to test these capacities, while at the same time making a contribution to local socio economic planning.  Thus, it describes how a consciously “ill structured” problem was presented to a group of postgraduate students; how light touch” facilitation was provided to stimulate understanding of the problem while at the same time a parallel process fostered relationships to support public participation in the local planning process.  The paper also describes the exciting potential created for interaction between disciplines in the university community and how students in particular, were exposed to a suite of non traditional problem solving, public participation and policy making tools, such as World Cafe, PLA (participatory learning and appraisal) and technology based public participation.  The paper concludes by interrogating the potential of the teaching method through reflecting on student feedback on learning outcomes, analysing reactions from external partners and participants in public consultations but emphasises the need for sustained levels of institutional support if the approach is to become more widely embedded.

University of Limerick