Critical pedagogical designs for SETS knowledge co-production: online peer- and problem-based learning by and for early career green infrastructure experts

(2023) 5:6 Feagan et al. Urban Transformations https://doi.org/10.1186/s42854-023-00051-1 Urban Transformations Open Access FRONTIERS PAPER Critical pedagogical designs for SETS knowledge co‑production: online peer‑ and problem‑based learning by and for early career green infrastructure experts Mathieu Feagan1* , Megan Fork2, Geneva Gray3, Maike Hamann4, Jason K. Hawes5, Elizabeth H. T. Hiroyasu6 and Brooke Wilkerson7,8 *Correspondence: 1 Department of Knowledge Integration, Faculty of Environment, University of Waterloo, 200 University Avenue West, Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1, Canada 2 Department of Biology, West Chester University, 700 South High Street, West Chester, PA 19383, USA 3 Department of Marine, Earth, and Atmospheric Sciences, North Carolina State University, 2800 Faucette Drive, 1125 Jordan Hall, Campus, Box 8208, Raleigh, NC 27695, USA 4 Centre for Sustainability Transitions, Stellenbosch University, 19 Jonkershoek Rd, Stellenbosch 7600, South Africa 5 School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan, Dana Building, 440 Church Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA 6 The Nature Conservancy, California, 830 S Street, Sacramento, CA 95811, USA 7 Department of Geography, System Dynamics Group, University of Bergen, P.O. Box 7800, 5020 Bergen, Norway 8 Department of Geography, Centre for Climate and Energy Transformation, University of Bergen, P.O. Box 7800, 5020 Bergen, Norway Abstract Despite a growing understanding of the importance of knowledge co-production for just and sustainable urban transformations, early career green infrastructure experts typically lack opportunities to practice transdisciplinary knowledge co-production approaches within their normal training and professional development. However, using online collaboration technologies combined with peer- and problem-based learning can help address this gap by putting early career green infrastructure experts in charge of organizing their own knowledge co-production activities. Using the case study of an online symposia series focused on social-ecological-technological systems approaches to holistic green infrastructure implementation, we discuss how critical pedagogical designs help create favorable conditions for transdisciplinary knowledge co-production. Our work suggests that the early career position offers a unique standpoint from which to better understand the limitations of current institutional structures of expertise, with a view towards their transformation through collective action. Keywords: Co-production, Critical pedagogy, Green infrastructure, Capacity building, Social-ecological-technological systems, Transformation, Online collaboration, Early career Science highlights ◦ Critical pedagogical designs help early career green infrastructure experts practice transdisciplinary knowledge co-production ◦ Online peer-led problem-based learning can support a social-ecological-technological systems approach to urban transformations ◦ Further research is warranted into critical and Indigenous pedagogies for shifting power and building institutional capacity for knowledge co-production © The Author(s) 2023. 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Urban Transformations (2023) 5:6 Policy and practice recommendations ◦ Early career green infrastructure experts should explore how online collaboration tools help practice knowledge co-production across institutional contexts ◦ Institutions of higher education should support such exploration to accelerate capacity-building for transdisciplinary knowledge co-production Introduction Within the context of sustainability transitions, knowledge co-production is increasingly recognized as necessary for addressing the complex intersections of climate change and urbanization (Frantzeskaki 2018). Defined as “iterative and collaborative processes involving diverse types of expertise, knowledge and actors to produce context-specific knowledge and pathways towards a sustainable future” (Norström et al. 2020), co-production is a core component in recent urban transformation case studies (Pereira et al. 2020; Buyana et al. 2021). However, implementing co-production in ways that transform dominant power relations remains an ongoing challenge (Avelino 2017; Pearsall et al. 2022), raising methodological and evaluative questions. Methodologically, who designs the co-production process, based on what ontological and epistemological starting points, who else is invited, when, and on what terms? Different possible responses to these questions lead to vastly different outcomes (Latulippe & Klenk 2020; ManuelNavarrete et al. 2021; Chakraborty et al. 2022). Likewise in terms of evaluation, who is best positioned to measure the success of co-production? Here, too, there is a range of responses with various confirmations and doubts about co-production’s effects on catalyzing urban transformations (Perry & Atherton 2017; Palmer et al. 2020; Peris & Bosch 2020). In this paper, we approach these methodological and evaluative questions – and their underlying challenge of defining and implementing a successful co-production process – from the standpoint of early career experts who, on two interrelated levels, are working across the social-ecological-technological systems (SETS) dimensions of green infrastructure (GI) (see Fig. 1). On a first level, these early career experts are working within a particular field of GI in which they have specialized knowledge, whether it be in green accounting (business and legal studies), safe-to-fail infrastructure (engineering), the history of urban greenspace (landscape architecture), or urban stream ecology, among other fields. On a second level, they also have knowledge about the institutional working conditions within which GI training and practice occur, whether through becoming an assistant professor in a particular academic department, interning at an engineering firm, volunteering with a non-profit organization, or holding a position in municipal government, for example. Yet, because of their early career status, they have not fully internalized the given institutionalized measures of success as their ow (...truncated)