EAT+CHANGE

Funding: Bundesministerium für Bildung, Wissenschaft und Forschung, OeAD – Agentur für Bildung und Internationalisierung/Sparkling Science 
A,ount of Funding: € 349.965
Duration: 10/2022 - 09/2025
Team: Ass.-Prof. Dr. Fabian Pettig (RFDZ-GW) (Projektleitung); Univ.-Prof. Dr. Anke Strüver (RCE Graz-Styria); Univ.-Prof. Dr. Ulrich Ermann (RFDZ-GW); Prof. Mag. Dr. Johannes Dorfinger (RFDZ-GW, PHST); Mag. Daniela Lippe (Praedoc, Projektmittel); Karoline Stöcklmayr (Praedoc, Projektmittel); Chiara Roithmeir (Studienassistentin); Mareen Taibinger (Studienassistentin)
Partners: Regionales Fachdidaktikzentrum für Geograhie und Wirtschaftskunde Graz (RFDZ-GW) , Pädagogische Hochschule Steiermark
Involved schools: Praxismittelschule der PH Steiermark, Mittelschule Dr. Renner, Mittelschule Graz-Webling

Description:
Responsibility for sustainable nutrition is discussed globally and nationally, but (not) practiced regionally and especially in everyday routines. For this reason, the project focuses on the everyday experiences of children and adolescents with nutrition (practices) in order to better understand how they address nutrition within their everyday life and environment: What everyday references do young people make to issues of a socially just and ecologically sustainable food system? In which everyday contexts does responsibility become concrete (for whom)? In which social perspectives and viewpoints are these and other questions embedded?

Within the framework of EAT+CHANGE, students from three secondary schools in Graz work together as co-researchers with academic researchers from the University of Graz to explore food practices and their socio-cultural contexts in everyday life. They identify strengths, weaknesses and potentials for change in the local environment. In the process, previously invisible layers of knowledge are made visible, and a dialogue is entered into with the local public.

In the project, the co-researchers actively participate in the success of the entire research process as experts of their living environments and the everyday practices that take place there: They formulate their own questions, which they pursue using the Photovoice method, and curate, present and discuss their research results. In the method, the co-researchers take photographs of their everyday life and environment, exploring contexts and manifestations of different food practices. The photographs are structured and reflected upon in group discussions in several workshops in order to uncover recurring narratives and ingrained patterns of thinking and acting about (non-)sustainable nutrition. In order to make the results visible, internal school exhibitions will be designed, which will be presented to decision-makers and the public in a large joint exhibition in Graz in the third year of the project. In this way, the research results should also enable local change processes in the environment of the co-researchers.

The workshop material used to implement the research projects will be continuously developed over the course of the project together with the co-researchers, the participating teachers and in close exchange with the Institute for Media Education at the University of Teacher Education Styria. In the form of a multimedia handout, this material will be made available digitally as an open educational resource and anchored in the educational system beyond the context of the project.