Not Just an Academic Exercise: Systems Thinking Applied to Designing Safer Alternatives

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dc.contributor.authorSchwarzman, Megan R.
dc.contributor.authorBuckley, Heather L.
dc.date.accessioned2021-03-13T18:31:20Z
dc.date.available2021-03-13T18:31:20Z
dc.date.copyright2019en_US
dc.date.issued2019
dc.description.abstractFor the last seven years, an interdisciplinary course known as Greener Solutions, offered by the University of California, Berkeley Center for Green Chemistry, has brought together graduate students in chemistry, environmental health, and engineering to understand each other’s disciplines, and to work together to develop safer alternatives to hazardous chemicals and manufacturing processes. Through the course, interdisciplinary teams of UC Berkeley students have worked with partner organizations to identify safer alternatives to chemicals of concern, including investigating safer preservatives in personal care products, nonfluorinated durable water-repellant coatings for outerwear, and safer cross-linkers to replace formaldehyde in permanent press textiles and diisocyanates in spray polyurethane foam insulation. Students undertake a bioinspired design process and then assess the potential health and environmental hazards associated with each of their proposed alternatives relative to hazards of the current chemistries. The students generate a focused alternatives assessment that considers technical performance, relative hazard and exposure potential, and feasibility, creating an “opportunity map” for the partner company and, ideally, the industry sector as a whole. The Greener Solutions model for interdisciplinary, inquiry-based learning is training a new generation of chemists and engineers in a systems approach to design: one that more fully considers the health and environmental implications of chemical and material choices. An adaptation of the Greener Solutions course model to serve undergraduate civil engineering students at University of Victoria, B.C. demonstrates how the course elements can serve a different subject matter and instructional level.en_US
dc.description.reviewstatusRevieweden_US
dc.description.scholarlevelFacultyen_US
dc.description.sponsorshipThe authors wish to acknowledge Martin Mulvihill for his original vision and work in co-developing and co-teaching Greener Solutions, as well as for providing input on an early version of this article; current Greener Solutions co-instructors, Thomas McKeag and William Hart-Cooper; and the students and partner companies who have collaborated on framing problems and developing inspiring solutions. Thank you to Anne-Marie Daniel, Aditi Gupta, Charlotte Lafleur and others at UVic for their input developing Green Safe Water. Thanks also to Michael Wilson and the peer reviewers who provided input on this manuscript. Greener Solutions has received past funding from California EPA DTSC Grant #14-T3945 (2015-2016) and US EPA Pollution Prevention grant #99T19601 (2014-2016), and from select partner companies.en_US
dc.identifier.citationSchwarzman, M. R. & Buckley, H. L. (2019). Not just an academic exercise: Systems thinking applied to designing safer alternatives. Journal of Chemical Education, 96(12), 2984–2992. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.9b00345en_US
dc.identifier.urihttps://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.9b00345
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/1828/12771
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherJournal of Chemical Educationen_US
dc.subjectGraduate Education/Researchen_US
dc.subjectCurriculumen_US
dc.subjectInquiry-Based/Discovery Learningen_US
dc.subjectProblem Solving/Decision Makingen_US
dc.subjectApplications of Chemistryen_US
dc.subjectConsumer Chemistryen_US
dc.subjectGreen Chemistryen_US
dc.subjectIndustrial Chemistryen_US
dc.subjectLearning Theoriesen_US
dc.subjectMaterials Scienceen_US
dc.subjectSystems Thinkingen_US
dc.subjectSustainabilityen_US
dc.titleNot Just an Academic Exercise: Systems Thinking Applied to Designing Safer Alternativesen_US
dc.typePostprinten_US

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