Conjoint study towards transformative landscape architectural education in Brazil

Abstract

The training of landscape architects in Brazil reproduces routinely the legend of Burle Marx as a self -made professional. That, however, need not be the case.

The central motivation for this work is the immature state of landscape education and of the profession in Brazil. Its intention is to contribute in the process of organising landscape architectural higher education in that country and, more widely, to aid educators in assessing their practice, identifying methods that can be used conjointly in education research.

Brazil's continental dimensions and notable environmental diversity require professionals that can act globally but also cater to particular regional needs.

Analysing the current state of the profession, a fragmented network and total lack of statistical data on demographic and educational characteristics of professionals were perceived as obstacles to the development of the profession. This information gap prompted the development of a web based survey of Brazilian landscape professionals and students, which provided a baseline of information and revealed the significant issues for development of the profession.

To inform recommendations for the Brazilian context, a study of international preferences in landscape education was then performed, using Choice Based Conjoint Analysis via the WWW. Analysis of the results provided a basis for recommendations towards a new educational paradigm.

Establishing courses with a transformative pedagogy that focus on coaching students into thinking like landscape architects rather than on the assimilation of a static knowledge base is the central recommendation of this research. The adoption of this paradigm will give opportunities to satisfy the need for local relevance and to prepare professionals for new roles in a changing job market with vanishing geographical and professional boundaries.