Overview
This assignment is the second portion of the team-based assignment started in Assignment, 3 Part 1. Assignment 3 Part 2 builds on the outline that you produced in 3 Part 1, and provides an opportunity to expand on the concepts that your team has explored and discussed throughout the course.
Assignment 3 requires that you deliver an ‘off the shelf’ methodology that a hypothetical client with no experience in climate risk assessment could use to lead /undertake a process in the sector or setting of your choice. In other words, you want to produce a guidebook that someone could use to complete a climate risk assessment for a specific setting or sector (e.g., a community, a set of buildings, an ecosystem). You need to provide everything they would need to effectively convene a process that assesses the risks faced by their sector or setting. While various guides are available, you are expected to create a customized guidance document that reflect best practices discussed in the course, and to provide strong justifications for the guidance you provide.
Instructions:
It is suggested that the guidance/methodology document contain at least the following:
– An introduction that describes the rationale, objective, and audience for your assessment.
– A description of the sector or setting you have chosen, including demographic and economic trends if applicable. This section can be somewhat brief, and does not provide guidance per se, but instead helps situate your instructor/reader.
– A list of ~5 relevant climate hazards and information on historical and future trends for each. Also include instructions for the hypothetical user in case they want to explore additional variables. This section combines guidance and content in order to give you the experience of producing useful climate data for end users.
– A detailed description of all of the steps involved in the assessment, along with a rationale/justification that includes references. This will likely include hazard and impact identification, as well as separate or combined vulnerability and risk assessments.
– An engagement plan that includes a list of stakeholders and a rationale for their inclusion in the process. You need to describe the various activities they will undertake (e.g., workshops) and provide an example of an agenda for one of the activities, or more if you chose.
– Guidance for summarizing the results of the risk assessment. This could involve producing graphics, key messages, communications materials, narrative summaries of the results, etc.
Requirements:
Your full proposal should be between 15-20 pages long, depending on your use of images, and assuming single spacing, not including references.
Use the currently accepted APA style for your write-up.
The assignment must be submitted on or before the due date.
Assessment Criteria:
This assignment corresponds to the following learning objectives:
- Evaluate core concepts of climate adaptation and resilience with a critical lens to solve problems and make climate action recommendations (Learning outcome 1.1)
- Locate reliable sources of evidence for climate adaptation strategies and assess reliability and validity of the evidence informing strategies (learning outcome 1.2)
- Use style, language and form of communication suitable for the context and audience and synthesize information and makes well-supported arguments (learning outcome 2.2)
- Apply transdisciplinary thinking to complex climate related problems and issues (learning outcome 2.4)
- Demonstrate competence in translating and mobilizing climate adaptation knowledge for use by multiple stakeholder groups (learning outcome 5.2)
See also: MACAL Academic Paper Assessment Rubric
Relevant Resource: RRU Library Guides on Academic Writing
Weight: 30% (Part 2)
Submit: to Assignment 3 Part 2 Moodle drop box.