Principles and Theories of Sustainable Design
HDSD670Z
Overview
To enrol in this unit, you must be accepted into a course from the provider.
Read before you start
Level of study: What does Postgraduate mean?
Postgraduate
EFTSL: What does EFTSL mean?
0.125
Delivery Method: What does delivery method mean?
Fully Online
Prerequisites: What are the prerequisites?
No
Duration:
13 weeks
Government loans available:
FEE-HELP FEE-HELP
Domestic student fee:
$2,300.00 (AUD)
International student fee:
$2,525.00 (AUD)
Description
The aim of this unit is to introduce you to the key principles and theories of the sustainable design of systems and structures. It is based on the idea that by recognising that we act in the world through frameworks of thinking and of organising society (ie. institutions), leads to a circumspect and responsible approach to life. The institutional bases of our expectations of the world are investigated along with the tools used to respond and act.
Enrolment Restriction
In order to enrol in this unit, you must be accepted into one of the following courses:
If you wish to seek approval to enrol in this unit without being accepted in a course, please contact OUA regarding the process.
Assessment
- Assignment 1 — Project Brief 1 (10%)
- Assignment 2 — Project Brief 2 (30%)
- Assignment 3 — Project Brief 3 (60%)
Learning Outcomes
At the completion of this unit the student should be able to:
- nominate key sustainability challenges in terms of environmental, economic and social issues at a global, national and local level
- critically analyse (proposed) activities for the knowledge/conceptual/epistemological structures they are embedded in – all the while recognising that the choice of knowledge structures is itself interpretation dependent
- propose changes to the way activities are constituted such that they are more clearly sustainable, eg. recognising the perverse incentives (to environmental sustainability) that form the context within which current actions in environment proceed
- recognise the 'instrumentation of sustainability', ie. the measures and indicators by which sustainability is currently defined and acted upon, and how to critically assess it
- prepare a sustainability statement within a given context
- evaluate current practices and tools available to 'sustainability practitioners' and propose improvements.
Topics
This unit addresses the following topics.
| Number | Topic |
|---|---|
| 1 | What are key sustainability challenges? |
| 2 | Sustainability as a new form of being and knowledge |
| 3 | Mapping sustainability as an activity |
| 4 | Defining the measures and indicators of sustainability |
| 5 | Who are sustainability practitioners |
| 6 | Envisioning a sustainable design future |
Study Resources
This unit is delivered using the following methods and materials:
Instructional Methods
- Blogs
- Chat rooms
- Discussion Forum/Discussion Board
- Embedded Multimedia
- Interactive Games
- Online Quizzes/Tests
- Online assignment submission
- Podcasting/Lecture capture
- Standard Media
- Streaming Multimedia
- Web links
- Wikis
Textbook information for this unit is currently being updated and will be available soon. Please check back regularly for updates. Alternatively, visit the Unibooks website and enter the unit details to search for available textbooks.
Relevant Courses
This unit is part of a major, minor, stream or specialisation in the following courses:
This unit may be eligible for credit towards other courses:
- Many undergraduate courses on offer through OUA include 'open elective' where any OUA unit can be credited to the course. You need to check the Award Requirements on the course page for the number of allowed open electives and any level limitations.
- In other cases, the content of this unit might be relevant to a course on offer through OUA or elsewhere. In order to receive credit for this unit in the course you will need to supply the provider institution with a copy of the Unit Profile in the approved format, which you can download here. Note that the Unit Profile is set at the start of the year, and if textbooks change this may not match the Unibooks textbook list.
