Outdoor & Environmental Studies

VCE Outdoor and Environmental Studies develops students’ understandings of outdoor environments, and the ways in which humans interact with, relate to and have impacted outdoor environments over time. ‘Outdoor environments’ encompasses landscapes, both local and further afield, that range in health from protected wilderness to those heavily impacted by human practices.

The study enables students to make critically informed comments on outdoor environmental issues, including asking questions about environmental sustainability and human connections to Country, both past and present. Students are able to understand the importance of change to environmental health from human or natural influences.

In this study, both passive and active outdoor experiences provide essential means for students to develop experiential knowledge of outdoor environments. Such knowledge is then enhanced through the study of outdoor environments from perspectives of environmental history, ecology and the social studies of human relationships with nature. The study also examines the complex interplay between outdoor environments and humans historically through to the modern day, and into the future.

Outdoor experiences suited to this study are a range of guided activities in areas such as farms, mining/logging sites, interpretation centres, coastal areas, rivers, mountains, bushlands, forests, urban parks, cultural and historical sites, and state or national parks. Activities undertaken could include bushwalking, cross-country skiing, canoe touring, cycle touring, conservation and restoration activities, marine exploration, and participation in community projects.

This study enables students to:

• develop experiential relationships with, and knowledge of, outdoor environments through practical experiences varying in duration
• develop an understanding of the ecological, historical, cultural, economic and social factors that have affected and will continue to affect the health of a range of different outdoor environments
• develop practical skills, knowledge and behaviours that promote safe and sustainable interaction with varied outdoor environments, both local and afar
• identify, analyse and contribute to the strategies used to protect, conserve and manage outdoor environments in a sustainable manner
• develop an understanding of historical and contemporary Indigenous peoples’ relationships with outdoor environments via knowledge systems and traditional management techniques
• understand the role of environmental policy in maintaining the health of outdoor environments in Australia, including the influence of the public in shaping local, state and federal government legislation.