Victoria Tait

Victoria is a Lecturer Practitioner in Education for Sustainability with a particular interest in the role of environmental and sustainability education in Initial Teacher Education, and in using sustainability as a tool for fostering interdisciplinarity and transdisciplinarity in teaching and learning.

victoria.tait@aru.ac.uk

Background

Victoria worked as a practitioner in Education for Sustainability for six years before starting in her role as Lecturer Practitioner at ARU.

As Lecturer Practitioner in Education for Sustainability, Victoria supports the implementation of sustainability and the Sustainable Development Goals in ARU’s Ruskin Modules and wider curriculum. Her focus is on ensuring that sustainability pedagogies and competencies align with institutional priorities linked to the Active and Inclusive curriculum.

Victoria also supports staff and students to run sustainability related initiatives in the curriculum, co-curriculum, and extra-curriculum, including:

• co-organised a conference with Dr Nicola Walshe in 2018, exploring the role of sustainability and environmental education in the BA Primary Education Studies course
• administered 'Be the Change' grants to staff, supporting them to carry out innovative sustainability activities in their curriculum
• run the university's annual Sustainability Dissertation Prize, aimed at recognising and rewarding best practice examples of dissertations that tackle complex sustainability challenges
• co-designed a CPD module for the Faculty of Business and Law, aimed at providing students with co-curricular opportunities to gain sustainability and project / event management skills
• supported the delivery of ARU’s first Sustainable Fashion Week.

In addition to this, Victoria also co-edits the Global Sustainability Institute’s annual So What? magazine and contributes to other initiatives run and organised by the Institute.

Teaching

Victoria is part of the ‘Trailblazer’ community who designed and delivered the first set of interdisciplinary Ruskin Modules in 2021/22. Working in partnership with a colleague from Social Work, she co-designed and co-delivered the Ruskin Module, ‘Climate Justice and Social Inequality: Can you be an agent for change?’. In 2022/23, she will lead the delivery of a new module, entitled ‘What if imagination could save the world?’, exploring how creativity and collective imagination can help us to envision more positive futures.

Victoria has delivered guest lectures for courses such as the BA Fashion Design course and BA Social Work course and welcomes new opportunities to work with staff to deliver sustainability related content that aligns with their Module and Course Learning outcomes.

Projects

Learning Design and Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) Co-Designs Bootcamp - Module lead and mentor for an international Bootcamp (2021/22). The Bootcamp supported 144 participants from around the world to develop their knowledge and expertise in learning design and ESD, and has received the backing and support of Dr Alexander Leicht, Head of ESD at UNESCO.

Qualifications

• PGCert, ARU
• Bachelor of Arts in English Literature and French (Hons), University of Southampton

Memberships, editorial boards

• FHEA – Fellow Advance HE 
• Bootcamp Mentor – Association of Learning Design and ESD

Selected recent publications

Walshe, N. & Tait, V. (2019). Making Connections: A conference approach to developing transformative environmental and sustainability education within initial teacher education. Environmental Education Research. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2019.1677858