Educating About/for Food Security Through Environmental Education: A Qualitative Study of Teacher Education Programs in Ontario

Abstract

Food insecurity is on the rise worldwide and within Canada due to a myriad of factors such as climatic instability, rising food prices and unsustainable food production practices. In this context, educational systems (e.g. schools and universities) can contribute to developing knowledge and awareness of food insecurity as well as fostering new ways of thinking and engaging with food premised on just and sustainable food systems. This study is situated within the field of environmental education where there is a growing body of research at the intersections of food and the environment. Likewise, it was guided by the theoretical framing of EcoJustice Education, which offers a way of teaching and learning premised on the belief that our thoughts and actions can foster and enhance more social and ecologically equitable connections between food and the environment. By engaging in semi-structured interviews with teacher educators in select teacher education programs in Ontario and conducting document reviews, I investigated how the integration of the topic of food security is taking place—or not—in the initial training of future teachers in the province. The results showed that integration is not consistent across the different organizational levels of the programs investigated (i.e. whole-program level and classroom level). Moreover, the interviews with teacher educators revealed that any practices aiming at the integration of food security topics in BEd programs were primarily guided by a sustainable cultures perspective, which sees the world as having interconnected relationships amongst all living things. This view is supported by the data analysis of interviews with teacher educators, the Ontario Ministry of Education curriculum documents, and select course syllabi. On the other hand, the school curriculum documents contained conflicting views on the topic, including an understanding of the world as being based on hierarchized relationships. This research advances the field of environmental education by further adding to the limited scholarship on the topic of food security in the context of EE, as well as contributing to an account of food security education and EE with a focus on teacher education in Ontario.