8801+Integration+report+2


 * Summary of unit 1 - did it live up to my expectations? **

At the completion of Unit 1 of my IHS Graduate Certificate, I find myself in a surprisingly different place to that which I’d imagined at the outset. Clearly, it is the intention of this study programme to provide students with a broad and richly varied exposure to 21 st  century humanity issues and understandings. I entered the course with a strong focus on environment. While this passion endures, I now find myself with a far more holistic view of human issues, one being inextricable from another. We cannot consider environmental degradation without confronting globalisation. Our understanding of human futures is greatly enhanced by an appreciation of our past. Social justice issues lie at the heart of our present social construct.

Unit 1 has opened my eyes to this web of information and more subtle complexities I hadn’t previously considered. It has enriched me, expanded my interests and options for future directions - and in some ways this makes my next steps more challenging! However, I relish the challenge and am excited by my rediscovered hunger for learning.

**A brief overview of the key contents and concepts covered in each topic weeks 6 to 14. ** **Week 6 ** This week’s dual focus on consumerism and globalisation in an Australian context provided some insightful if alarming statistics on the rising disparity between rich and poor - both within Australia, and looking at our nation as part of a world map. Our geographical isolation and financial stability encouraged by such phenomena as our eagerness to exploit our natural resources, has afforded us some cushioning from the more dramatic of negative effects as the world goes through it tumult. But this happy bubble cannot persist infinitely. We cannot take only the good from the world pool. At some point, globalisation draws us into the world arena. Additionally, issues such as overconsumption carry their own inbuilt failure mechanisms. Australia now has some significant decisions to make about its role on a world stage.

**Week 7 ** Week 7 was a confronting assignment for a student living in one of the world’s wealthiest nations. The statistically stark contrasts between rich and poor are confronted daily by those who have little or nothing. But for a people living in affluence, they provide a bitter pill, more easily ignored.

In researching numbers on preventable disease, education, water, income and consumption, the gap became more and more incredible. It made me reflect on many facets of my life, which I take for granted. It made me consider the smallness of the problems I think I face. And it heightened my awareness of the responsibility of those who can take action, to do so on behalf of those who cannot, on issues of education, family planning, health and sanitation, and our own behaviours in the field of economic development and consumerism.

**Week 8 ** While the previous week drew our attention to the great social divides in the world (largely driven by economic fortunes), this week posed questions about what we really need, in order to survive. As Max-Neef’s Scale indicates, Australians for the most part, enjoy many expressions of those needs, again however, we take many of them for granted. Many of them - such as a sense of humour - are considered a core component of our cultural identity. It surprised me to consider for the first time, the interrelatedness of those needs, as well as our deep, implicit desire to fulfil them. The second question for the week counterpointed the concept of needs with that of economic need. The GDP was used as an example of a humanly constructed ‘need’. In researching this topic, I was drawn back to two reference points I came across some years back. One, I had offered in a post to fellow students, as a fascinating look at the construct of the economics machine - a BBC documentary called //[|The Century of the Self] //<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">, and the other, <span style="color: windowtext; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">[|a quote from Robert Kennedy] <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;"> regarding Gross National Product (a different, though related measure) - which I included in my Final Project //<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">Pursuing Eudaimonia - Establishing a common benchmark for global action. // **<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">Week 9 ** <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">Quality of life was at the core of the topic for this week. The assignment set encouraged us to consider what this really meant, and how Australian life is presently defined by such perameters. Yet the model is fundamentally flawed. We have the potential to enrich our quality of life enormously - both within present contexts and by adding measures of sustainable quality - if we reconfigure our methods for achieving this quality. Referred to as a time of Great Transition, it allowed students to consider some of the more exciting opportunities for human advancement in Australia in the area of sustainable development.

**<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">Week 10 ** <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">Future modelling is an area where trends, science, history and conjecture all meet. In this week we were offered three potential outcomes, based on a hybrid of the above. Such an exercise is highly useful as a roadmap for present day humanity. It is a matter of exploring consequence of behaviours and desirability of outcomes. There are no perfect solutions as all change involves pain. But the assignment clearly showed that neither a descent into barbarisation or pursuit of current patterns of conventional globalisation can lead to optimal outcomes. Only by changing our perceptions of values and taking charge of the re-design of societal behaviours and measures, can we move forward into a more equitable, desirable future.

**<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">Weeks 11, 12, 13, 14 ** <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">These weeks have been largely devoted to the development of my final project for the unit. In considering the brief for this project, my decision to explore the concept of Aristotle’s //<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">eudaimonia //<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;"> in a 21 <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">st <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;"> century context was based on both my personal belief that optimism and positive action are essential if we are to find solutions to current and future challenges, and the need to take an interdisciplinary approach to this project, if it were truly to be a composite of the many and varied points of view on life, from around the world.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;"> Little did I realise as I embarked, what an enormous task I’d set myself! I expected to find a few historical references and overlay those against a cross section of modern day values, to arrive at a contemporary result. However, eudaimonia has been and continues to be the subject of huge debate, in philosophical, religious, cultural - even economic circles!

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">What heartened me and increased my enthusiasm for digging deeper with each step, was the resurgence of interest in the topic over recent years, as many people have begun to question the values upon which present day society has based itself. Cross-culturally it seems there is a tide of awakening to the superficiality and unsustainability of the construct of many facets of contemporary living. It became entirely appropriate therefore, to take a step back and consider some of humanity’s earlier wisdoms in the form of the writings of one of our greatest Greek philosophers. I gained enormous understanding of the complexities of trying to overlay cross-cultural values as I worked to establish universal understanding - even the concept of ‘universals’ became a topic I was compelled to consider in its own right. the end result is a project of which I am enormously proud. It is not perfect, and I am sure will be improved over time and perhaps, with added input. But as an example of utilising the learnings of the first unit of this IHS course, I feel it is the very best possible representation of my understanding thus far.

**//<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">Skills learned or developed, gains from unit, interests and attitudes and future directions. //** <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">In addition to further growth of the skills mention in Integration Report 1, I would add my ability to use PowerPoint and develop graphics for the final project. Obviously a background in advertising assisted me enormously in the field of designing my project templates and graphic inclusions. However, I did not know very much at all about Adobe Illustrator or PowerPoint when I began. This meant I had to ask a lot of people a lot of questions. Sometimes that included quizzing customers at the cafe where I make coffee - so that in the time it took to make and deliver a latte with two sugars, I quickly asked tech-savvy customers about the intricacies of PowerPoint templates and transitions!

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">The great joy of this of course, is that a huge number of people across a diverse range of professions and interests, are all aware of the fact I am studying and the concept of eudaimonia which I researched. I could even hand out copies of my final report to quite a few interested parties!

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">This collaborative trend has become a part of my life since these studies began. I find myself more connected with my community as a result, and my interest in other perspectives and values has also grown. My confidence in asking questions about areas I do not understand has increased.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">Probably one key area where I remain uncertain, is that of interaction with our course facilitators. Aware of the enormous burden of responsibility for many students and constraints on time, I felt I was often hesitant to approach Neville with questions (unless it became a matter of failing a weekly assignment due to lack of understanding!) and my frustration with the isolation of some facets of online study as an inhibition to collaboration. I will have this discussion with Neville once the unit is over an hopefully, he has some breathing space. I know he fully intended to set up regular Skype meetings with online students and whether this happens with him or Mark Paynter in the next unit, I will do all I can to assist in facilitating this opportunity.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">I would too, like to appeal to the University of Western Australia, as a student, in imploring administrators to consider the enormous value of this course. I can see it becoming an enormous area of growth for the University - and paving the way for UWA to become pioneers in one of the most relevant, important fields of study of the modern era. Courses which channel learning down narrower, more defined paths will continue to equip professionals for key roles in society moving forward. But the anthropocene will need understanding of a broad palette of issues and their interrelatedness, if we are to install future leaders and thinkers, capable of addressing core human issues. This course could provide an essential foundation for such individuals.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">As for where this training will take me from here, I am becoming restless in my current job - which was always a mere platform for income during study time - and keen to activate my greater involvement in the issues about which I am learning. I have been offered short-term contract work with the Australian Conservation Foundation, so that is a great start. And though I do not know where the course will lead, I am confident opportunities will continue to present themselves, as I continue study and expand my collaborative efforts.