As a student from one of IFSTAL’s five partner institutions (City, Reading, Warwick, Oxford and LCIRAH) you will have the opportunity to take part in a range of activities and events hosted by IFSTAL over the course of the year. By engaging with IFSTAL you will develop a range of skills and knowledge above and beyond what you would normally acquire from your studies, thereby preparing you for tackling complex food systems challenges. Furthermore, IFSTAL will help you to work collaboratively and productively with the widest range of people working in the food system.
In order to enhance this experience, we have created a ‘Journey’ document that can be used to help track participation and progress through the IFSTAL year and help create a learning experience that will benefit your current studies. A key aspect of this journey is becoming a reflective practitioner – someone who practices reflecting on who they are, where they are, and where they want to be. This is useful not only for learning about food systems thinking, but also in career development. We will help students to develop this ability over the course of IFSTAL through guiding you to:
- Look Inward at your values, interests, knowledge, skills and reputation;
- Look Outward at food system issues, local and national employment trends and your network; and
- Look Forward at your options, goals and how to integrate what you’ve discovered.
“From an early age, we’re taught to break apart problems in order to make complex tasks and subjects easier to deal with. But this creates a bigger problem . . . we lose the ability to see the consequences of our actions, and we lose a sense of connection to a larger whole.”
– Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline
The Journey document can be found on the IFSTAL portal under the orange ‘online course’ button.
We at IFSTAL look forward to joining you on your food systems journey!
Find out more by signing up to the Portal, coming to one of our launch events, or contacting your local Education Coordinator.
Blog by Dr Kelly Reed, IFSTAL Education Coordinator, University of Warwick
Leave a Reply