EU Soil Health Awareness Research Project Underway in the School
Dr Claire McDonnell is working with Post Doctoral Researcher Dr Caroline McGowan on the EU Horizon funded project, LOESS - Literacy boost through an Operational Educational Ecosystem of Societal actors on Soil health. The project will run for three years and focuses on increasing soil health awareness, by developing educational offers and training programmes addressing multiple actors, stakeholders and target groups connected to soil education.
For the purposes of the project, soil health is defined as ‘The capacity of soil to function as a vital living ecosystem that sustains and is sustained by plants, animals, and humans’. Soil is an indispensable ally for climate change mitigation and adaptation. As a result, people need more than scientific information and we all need to understand how healthy soils impact our lives.
While the TU Dublin team is contributing to most project work packages, the main focus will be on tasks related to soil health literacy in higher education and capacity building for the implementation of Community Engaged Research and Learning (CERL) projects related to soil health. CERL involves university students working with community partners on collaboratively-designed, real-life projects within the curriculum for mutual benefit. Partners may include, for example, environmental conservation groups, urban food and city greening initiatives or community gardens. If you would like to find out more about the project, please contact claire.mcdonnell@tudublin.ie or caroline.mcgowan@tudublin.ie