PhD Courses in Denmark

This course has two overarching objectives: the first is to provide students with specific skills for the review and synthesis of existing scientific knowledge in support of unbiased foundations for scientific research and the production of management and policy advice. The second is to provide experience of a realistic working scenario for the production of evidence based advice, and exposure to the producers and recipients of such advice in an aquatic resource management context. This course aims to provide concrete skills and knowledge that are often learned by academics, on the job, in an impromptu manner.

A student who has met the objectives of the course will be able to:

• Classify the range of ecosystem services that a given case-study habitat/resource provide into recognised categories.
• Compare and critique possible management tools that could be employed to improve a casestudy habitat/resource.
• Analyse how the identified management tools are enabled by various domestic and European policies, and demonstrate sources of potential alignment or conflict in these polices.
• Select and evaluate a management strategy for the protection of a single ecosystem component within a case-study.
• Appraise proposed management strategies for a range of ecosystem components in a given case-study habitat/resource, with reference to the given arguments, evidence and policy relevance.
• Design a management strategy for a given aquatic context. Justify the selected actions by describing the expected trade-offs and interactions between different ecosystem components.
• Conduct a systematic literature review and synthesise and analyse findings.
• Produce and present a communicative poster targeting a scientific audience.
• Produce and evaluate written recommendations in the form of a policy brief for managers and policy makers based on best available knowledge as summarized and presented by peers.
• Evaluate and provide constructive feedback on peer’s scientific posters and advisory reports.

The management of aquatic resources is shifting away from a focus on single system components (such as fisheries or water quality) and towards more holistic forms of management; (i.e. Ecosystem Approach to Management). While there are varying degrees of complexity under this umbrella term (e.g. EBFM or ICZM), they all share a requirement for the synthesis of existing knowledge across disparate disciplines. There are many actors and stakeholders, (e.g. ministries, construction consultancies, environmentalNGOs, fisheries organisations, wind energy companies, local governments), with traditionally narrow foci, who require people with the ability to collate, digest and synthesise knowledge from outside their traditional realm of experience, and to provide advice with a broad, systemic view. This course provides an opportunity to learn appropriate tools and skills for these tasks, as well as an opportunity to gain experience in the collaborative nature of producing advice, all while facilitating interaction with potential future employers. Topics covered in this course include (1) ecosystem services and tradeoffs, (2) how to undertake systematic reviews, (3) what is stakeholder engagement, (4) the relevance of legislation in advice, (5) science communication, (6) from policy to management action and (7) the synthesis of knowledge in support of advice. The course is structured around a topical, multi-stakeholder management problem in the realm of aquatic resources (e.g. the extraction of sediment from the Øresund for construction). This problem is identified by the course responsible, in collaboration with representatives from industry / public sector, each year. In the first class, this pre-identified problem is analysed as a class and dissected into smaller components (e.g. fish production, water quality, coastal erosion, marine mammal conservation). Working in pairs or independently, students utilise their diversity of backgrounds and personal knowledge to address one sub-component per pair, by undertaking a systematic review during a series of class-time workshops and as home assignments. The results of this review are presented in a poster session, held halfway through the course, where stakeholders who were involved in deciding the problem are invited to attend. Posters will be graded by teachers and peergrading during the poster session. Subsequently, the collection of results and posters from the whole class form the foundation of knowledge from which individuals write an advisory report on the broader, multi-sectorial problem as the final assessment. During this second half of the course, lectures and guest lectures will inspire management solutions and how to best produce evidencebased advice.