CO-DESIGNING PLANETARY HEALTH EDUCATION
Empowering students and enhancing educator capacity
Embedded Files
Planetary Health is a solutions-oriented, transdisciplinary field and social movement focused on analyzing and addressing the impacts of human disruptions to Earth’s natural systems on human health and all life on Earth.
Planetary Health Alliance, Johns Hopkins University
This FMNHS Education Fellowship (January 2023 - June 2024) project was designed to:
Increase educator confidence and capacity to offer more planetary health curricula to our future health workforce,
Develop fit-for-purpose learning and teaching activities, designed by and for health professions students, and
Empower our future health workforce (FMNHS students) to contribute to address complex, global challenges.
Using a co-design approach, self-nominated Champion Students and Educators from the Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences at Monash University were supported to reformulate existing learning and teaching materials to embody best-practice Planetary Health Education (PHE)*. We engaged 69 PHE Champions including 48 students from 12 different disciplines. Together, they developed, piloted and refined a suite of workshop, lecture, assessment, tutorial, laboratory and other L&T activities which are being promoted for use by all educators within the Monash University's Faculty MNHS.
This project builds upon previous work, captured in this Moodle Site. For access, please contact liza.barbour@monash.edu
* Guzmán, C. A. F., Aguirre, A. A., Astle, B., Barros, E., Bayles, B., Chimbari, M., ... & Zylstra, M. (2021). A framework to guide planetary health education. The Lancet Planetary Health, 5(5), e253-e255.
In 2025, the project team was awarded a Vice Chancellor's Award by Monash University in recognition of the impact on learning and teaching, in the category of 'Programs that Enhance Learning'.
This video (3 minutes) provides an overview of the project and its impact so far.
Introducing our PHE Champion Educators
By clicking the names of these Champion Educators, you will be able to see details about their Champion Students, the co-design workshops and the L&T activities they co-designed, piloted and reviewed.
The Learning and Teaching Materials designed by all Champion Students and Educators from each of these disciplines are available HERE
Please note: These materials are only accessible for Monash University staff. For inquiries, please contact liza.barbour@monash.edu
Who are the Project Team?
FMNHS Education Fellow
This project was led by Dr Liza Barbour, who was awarded the Education Fellowship from the Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences. Liza is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Nutrition, Dietetics and Food, and has been an educator at Monash University since 2009. Together with her colleague Dr Julia McCartan, Liza designed one of Australia's first undergraduate units on food sustainability systems for nutrition and dietetics students, which she continues to coordinate (NUT3006). Liza also coordinates NUT3082 Public Health Nutrition.
Liza is an Advanced Accredited Practising Dietitian (AdvAPD) with practical experience in community and clinical dietetics, food service and public health nutrition. These roles have enabled Liza to work in the Pilbara and Gascoyne regions of remote Western Australia, Alice Springs, the Kingdom of Tonga and Metropolitan Melbourne. Liza is an active member of Dieitians Australia's Food and Environment leadership committee and led the development of their first National position paper on Healthy and Sustainable Diets. Liza is an Australian Advisor on the International Confederation of Dietetic Association's (ICDA) sustainable food systems toolkit. Liza's PhD explored the role of local government policy in promoting a population-wide shift to healthy and environmentally sustainable diets.
To ensure interdisciplinary engagement and translation, Liza formed a project team with educators and students as outlined below. These individuals contributed significantly to the project design, execution and research translation activities throughout.
Interim Associate Dean (Learning & Teaching)
Lecturer, School of Clinical Sciences
Monash Sustainable Development Institute (MSDI)
Lecturer, Nursing & Midwifery
PhD Candidate & Lecturer, MCSHE
Stephanie Cameron
Student Facilitator and Research Assistant, Medicine
The project team would also like to acknowledge A/Prof Margaret Simmons who was involved in the project design and early planning stages.
Page updated
Report abuse