SESI

Culminating Project

In the culminating project, the city government is creating a new comprehensive plan for future sustainable development and is interested in smart growth. 

 

The comprehensive plan focuses on the following inter-related plan elements:

  1. Energy and climate change reduction
     
  2. Park system and recreational opportunities
     
  3. Transportation and safety systems
     
  4. Economic development, commercial areas and tourism
 
In the Built Environment Project, students became familiar with a ward in their city and have developed ideas to make their ward environmentally, socially, and economically sustainable. This project extends many of the concepts that students learned in that project. A primary focus of this project is on how to make the neighborhoods more livable for its citizens and apply smart growth principles.
 
Two versions of this project have been developed. One version that has been developed for implementation in science classes and another version has been developed for implementation in social studies classes.
 
For both science and social studies classes, the students’ goal is to incorporate one inter-related plan element into their city for making a ward and the city more environmentally sustainable.

(A) In science classes, students will develop a presentation for their city that includes smart growth principles and further promotes environmental sustainability.

(B) In social studies classes, students will develop a presentation for their city that includes smart growth principles and further promotes environmental, social, and economic sustainability.
 

As students develop their proposals, they are to focus on four or more of the following themes: 

  1. Land use - includes vacant land, brownfields, redevelopment opportunities, residential areas, commercial areas, and industrial areas.
  2. Environment and Natural Resources – includes natural resources, floodplains and wetlands, carbonate geology and sinkholes, water quality, air quality, and brownfields.
  3. Transportation – includes bicycle and pedestrian travel, public transportation, bus networks, parking, and highway and street networks.
  4. Economic development - includes land and buildings, downtown revitalization, neighborhood commercial development, arts and culture.
  5. Neighborhood Conservation – includes clean and safe environments, public services, amenities, and land use.
  6. Community Facilities – includes parks and recreation, solid waste and recycling, health care, public buildings, and public safety.
  7. Housing – includes housing and neighborhoods, assisted housing, and special needs housing.
     

Students develop a presentation one of the following inter-related plan elements: 

  1. Energy and climate change reduction
     
  2. Park system and recreational opportunities
     
  3. Transportation and safety systems
     
  4. Economic development, commercial areas and tourism
 

In the presentation, students:

  1. Identify locations for reuse of existing sites or changing existing infrastructure.
     
  2. Identify locations for new development, features, facilities, parks, or open spaces.
     
  3. Create a Web GIS map for their area that reflects their proposed changes.
     
  4. Justify their proposed changes with data from the Web GIS.
     
  5. Describe how their proposed changes promote Smart Growth principles for their city.
     
  6. Explain how those changes are environmentally sustainable for their city. Explain how the city will be more livable for its citizens.
     
  7. Include images and geospatial data from the Web GIS map to support their justifications. They must include at least 4 screenshots from their Web GIS map that highlights their inter-related plan element change they would make in their city.
     
  8. They need to include screenshots are very detailed and includes labels, legends, and important features of your area to support their improvement.
     
  9. Include at least 4 slides that address at least four or more themes from this list:
    1. Land Use
    2. Environment and Natural Resources
    3. Transportation
    4. Economic Development
    5. Neighborhood Conservation
    6. Community Facilities
    7. Housing
  •  
 
Important Notes: 
  1. Prior to implementing the investigation, be sure that you have set up an ARCGIS.com account for your classrooms.
     
  2. Prior to implementation, we recommend that you discuss with your students about smart growth. Smart Growth is a term used to describe the desire and strategy to manage growth and development to improve people’s quality of life while protecting our natural resources. Smart Growth encourages growth and development in ways that focus on wise resource use and reducing sprawl. These include:
    1. ​Creating mixed use in buildings, using existing structures and vacant lots (infill development) or repurposing abandoned industrial sites (brownfield redevelopment).
    2. Building along public transportation routes.
    3. Preserving open space, natural beauty, and critical environmental areas.
       
  3. ​Prior to implementation, we recommend that you discuss sustainability with your students. In the context of this project, sustainability focuses on how to make neighborhoods more livable for its citizens. For science classes, we recommend that you focus on environmental sustainability. In social studies classes, we recommend that you focus on social, economic, and environmental sustainability.
     
  4. The instructional materials have been developed for use in a specific city. The MS Word versions can be modified for implementing this project in other locations.
     
  5. There are three important documents for this learning activity. These include:
​(A) Culminating Project Proposal – This provides students with an overview and details about the project.
(B) Student Planning Document – This provides students with a series of questions to guide students with exploring and analyzing the data in their ward to think critically about improvements needed to make their ward more environmentally, socially, and economically sustainable.
(C) Culminating Project Rubric – This is a valid and reliable criterion-based assessment measure for the project that focus on geospatial thinking skills.
 
Important Implementation Notes:
 
  1. Some students may have difficulty articulating a change to make to their city that encourages smart growth. One effective strategy is to engage students in a “Think-Pair-Share” activity to have them share their initial ideas. If a student’s idea is not intuitively focused on promoting environmental sustainability (for example, build a new hospital or fire station), prompt students to think about how to make their development of a new building more environmentally sustainable. Prompt students to think about redeveloping existing structures. They may consider adding green roofs to building, building on vacant lots, and using energy efficient or green building designs.
     
  2. Explicitly model to students how to take a detailed screen shot and to produce a caption clearly conveys the map data or information. The screenshot should include the map legend. The caption should clearly communicate the information or data that the image conveys. The interpretation of the map colors should be clearly articulated. In this project, captions should clearly convey the proposed change.
     
  3. As students develop their presentations, remind them to clearly articulate smart growth principles with detailed explanations.

Materials Needed:



 


Handouts

For Science Classes
Culminating Project Activity - Science (PDF/MS Word)
Planning Document for Science Classes (PDF/MS Word)
Geospatial Skills Rubric for Science Classes (PDF/MS Word)
 
For Social Studies Classes
Culminating Project Activity - Social Studies (PDF/MS Word)
Planning Document for Social Studies Classes (PDF/MS Word)
Geospatial Skills Rubric for Social Studies Classes (PDF/MS Word)
 
Building 21 Rubric (PDF/MS Word)
 

ArcGIS