Coral Reef Education and Australian High School Students.

This paper reports on a PhD research project investigating marine education in coral reef environments along the Queensland coast. The study explored relationships between awareness, attitudes and ecological skills of high school students who were trained in coral reef ecology and monitoring in offshore sites along the Great Barrier Reef in 2002 and 2003. The research investigated the question of whether experiential marine education can change the reported environmental knowledge, attitudes and ecological agency of student participants. Some key data outcomes are presented and implications for effective marine education strategies discussed. Introduction Educational programs that focus on humans and their relationship to coral reefs are becoming necessary, as reef structures along the Queensland coast come under mounting ecological pressure (GBRMPA, 2003; Hughes et al., 2003; Talbot, 1995). Marine education has been defined by Roseanne Fortner (1991) as that part of the total educational process that enables people to develop sensitivity to and a general understanding of the role of the seas in human affairs and the impact of society on the marine and aquatic environments. Improving pedagogical techniques concerning aquatic environments is valuable since continuing intensification of human activity near coastline areas adversely affects marine and coastal ecosystems worldwide (NOAA, 1998). Education can have a pivotal role in drawing attention to these problems and this study investigates various techniques of promoting sustainable futures through student training. This education research focused on a developing field that has very few formalised objectives and outcomes. Hence, it was necessary to establish a set of criteria with which to evaluate student participants’ changes with respect to achievable learning outcomes. The Three A’s of Coastal and Marine Studies, MESA’s (Marine Education Society of Australasia) education guidelines for marine education, were used and they relate to improvement in awareness, attitudes and agency/action (MESA, 2004). In this research, the terms of awareness, attitude and agency were defined in the following manner. Environmental awareness was understood to relate to a thing we know, as incorporated in an act of knowing or being aware of issues and action skills related to the coastal and marine environments. An environmental attitude relates to recognising the importance of ecologically sustainable development, and the conservation value of coastal and natural environments. The meaning of ecological agency was the degree of a person’s intention to act in a particular situation with regard to the marine environment. The research project described in this paper investigated these factors and was carried out in Queensland during 2003. What we have here is a story about taking senior high school students out to coral reefs, and then measuring the educational effects of their marine environmental experiences in relation to similar groups of students from varied exposures to learning. The students came from five Queensland high schools, with most of the students enrolled in senior school marine studies programs. These students and their teachers worked with the researcher both in the classroom and at coral reef sites, with assistance provided by the Marine Teachers Association of Queensland. The students were taught about coral reef ecology in a classroom setting and then taken on a subsequent reef trip to learn coral reef monitoring. A commercial vessel was chartered, and while at the reef site students learned more about reef ecology. Once in the water they collected data about environmental indicators, such as fish and invertebrates, along a 50 m transect line. The snorkel sites chosen were Hastings Reef, Breaking Patches. Michaelmas Cay, Fitzroy Island and Green Island off shore from the city of Cairns in far north Queensland and Northwest Island offshore from Gladstone, Queensland. All the students involved in the study live in coastal cities in what are known as ‘reef neighbouring communities’. The research reviewed different types of learning situations with separate student groups and measured changes in environmental awareness, attitudes and agency. Even though the link between environmental attitudes and ecological agency has not appeared strong, the literature suggests that without a change in attitudes toward the environment and ecology there can be no change in ecological agency (Ajzen, 1988; Ajzen & Fishbein, in press). Hence, research concerning marine education and impacts in reef neighbouring areas are important when considering students’ ecological relationships. My research explored ways of thinking about a possible change process and the nexus between marine experiential education, environmental awareness, attitudes, and ecological agency. The challenge was to develop methods for answering questions about how marine experiential education performs with respect to outcomes. This study builds upon a number of previous studies regarding Australian students’ environmental awareness (e.g. Alphabetised Blaikie, 1992, 1993; Clarke, 1996; Connell et al., 1998; Fien, Yencken, Connell, & Sykes, 2002; Finger, 1994; Schaper, 2002; Skamp, Boyes, & Stanisstreet, 2003; and Whitehouse, 2002). The benefit to participating students was they learned fieldwork skills, learned more about reef ecology and gained insight into marine work. Methods The effectiveness of classroom learning and reef trips were investigated by collecting both descriptive and survey data to evaluate which types of marine education interventions and strategies worked best to enhance young adults’ propensity for positive attitudes and actions towards coral reef sustainability. Students were subjected to differing levels of exposure to classroom learning and direct experience with reefs. Self-reported changes of students’ awareness, environmental attitudes and ecological agency intentions were analysed after they participated in a coral reef monitoring program and were compared to a control group from the same schools who received no educational interventions. This program consisted of a classroom presentation and an actual reef experience. Classroom presentations consisted of PowerPoint and hands-on education conducted by the researcher, who explained reef ecology and relationships between terrestrial environments and coral reefs. The 30 to 60 minute presentations introduced pictorial representations of reef creatures to be counted, a coral polyp role-playing dance involving the students, and a classroom demonstration of coral reef monitoring activities. All this was done in preparation for the students’ trip to the reef. The reef experience consisted of a trip to the reef on a charter vessel with 26 to 55 students, and a review of the indicator species for identification purposed in preparation for monitoring. The students snorkelled along the transect line on the reef, recording information on their underwater slates and were assisted by the researcher and their teachers. The monitoring methodology was developed by Reef Check International (Hodgson & Stepath, 1999), which is a coral reef monitoring program developed for use by volunteer groups all around the world (www.reefcheck.org). The data collected by the students was not submitted, as this was a training exercise, providing an opportunity to structure the reef experience and for the students to learn a useful marine monitoring technique. The monitoring procedures provided a context for the students to learn the reef ecology, actually get in the water with the animals and physically write down what they saw, while also enhancing the relationship building experience between students and the reef. The total number of high school students used in this analysis was 320 (n = 320), and the sample was divided into the four groups depicted in Figure 1, and then compared. Students groups were surveyed and observed in a number of learning situations to gather educational outcome data. The categories were a control group (Group 4, n = 74), who were surveyed over the same length of time, but were not given the classroom presentation or a reef trip (Figure 1). This group had no contact with the researcher. Group 3, was a collection that only received new reef experience, and did not receive the prior classroom presentation (n = 97). Group 2 received the classroom presentation, but was not taken to the reef (n = 64). The marine experiential education group (Group 1, n = 85) was exposed to both the classroom presentation and an offshore reef experience (Figure 1). A pre-test post-test experimental design was used to measure reported changes in environmental awareness, attitudes and agency and provided the data analysed in this research. It incorporated a survey questionnaire, which was answered both before and after the educational interventions (pre-post test) as shown in Figure 2. Attitude and agency questions were designed using a six-point response scale: 6=strongly agree, 5=somewhat agree, 4 = mildly agree, 3 = mildly disagree, 2 = somewhat disagree, and 1 = strongly disagree. Therefore, a score of 6 on a statement denotes the most positive attitude or agency and a score of 1 denotes the most negative score, so the higher the score the more positive the attitude or agency. It was decided not to have a middle or noncommittal score, and the scale was designed such that the participants had to choose to be either positive or negative. Numerical scores assigned to responses were reversed for negatively worded statements, and this was done to prevent an individual from developing a pattern of answering the statements in a certain way, such as agreeing with all the statements (Babbie, 2002). The answers from the nine questions in the awareness portion of the questionnaires were scored in both the pre and post-test and then, the two were subtracted to get a measure of