Course Title: Housing and Health

Part A: Course Overview

Course Title: Housing and Health

Credit Points: 12.00

Terms

Course Code	Campus	Career	School	Learning Mode	Teaching Period(s)
BUIL1323	City Campus	Postgraduate	325H Property, Construction & Project Management	Face-to-Face	Sem 2 2021
BUIL1323	City Campus	Postgraduate	325H Property, Construction & Project Management	Internet	Sem 2 2022, Sem 2 2024

Course Coordinator: Nicola Willand

Course Coordinator Phone: +61 3 99253679

Course Coordinator Email: nicola.willand@rmit.edu.au

Course Coordinator Location: 8.8.24

Course Coordinator Availability: by apointment

Pre-requisite Courses and Assumed Knowledge and Capabilities

Assumed Knowledge and Capabilities:

Students should have satisfactorily completed an Australian Bachelor degree, and/or an equivalent international qualification, and/or at least five years of relevant work experience or professional practice.

Course Description

Despite the growing body of evidence, links between housing and health are often overlooked as we plan, build and live in our homes. This online elective brings together students from various disciplines. It provides a platform to develop your knowledge of the relationship among our built environment and physiological, mental and social health outcomes and to work in multi-disciplinary teams to propose holistic solutions. The dynamic system of housing and health will be explored from the urban to the interior scale, from the design through to the construction and maintenance phases, and from material, contextual, social and public health perspectives.

Housing is a social determinant of health. Addressing the complexity and the many facets of the system requires overcoming the silo-orientation of housing and health related disciplines and the co-production of innovative and transformative strategies. During this course, emphasis is placed on transdisciplinary learning, critical analysis and applied research. This will include your engagement with and learning from key stakeholders in relation to housing theories, policies, practices, advocacy and research, to gain practical capabilities in how you may improve people’s quality of life and reduce housing-related health inequalities.

Objectives/Learning Outcomes/Capability Development

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Course Learning Outcomes (CLOs)

Upon successful completion of this course, you will be able to:

CLO1 - Identify and evaluate the components, links and causal relationships in the complex system of housing and health.

CLO2 - Analyse and critically reflect on discipline-specific approaches to housing and health to inform future practice.

CLO3 - Apply research and theory to critically analyse case study buildings, developments, policies, programs and practices with regards to housing related challenges for health.

CLO4 - Collaborate effectively across disciplines to formulate holistic strategies to mitigate and manage housing-related health challenges.

Overview of Learning Activities

Learning in this course comprises a combination of interactive online workshops as a combination of lectures and tutorials. Lectures will introduce new material and provide fundamental knowledge for each topic. Tutorial time will offer the opportunity for class and group discussion and debate on readings and guest lectures.

Project work and interactions with stakeholders, such as researchers, advocates, policy makers, practitioners and representatives of various tenure groups, is an important aspect of the course. You will learn from, collaborate across and utilise strategies from various disciplines. This will enable you to combine knowledge from multiple perspectives and real life experiences to prepare you to develop speculative solutions to complex problems around housing and health.

 It is expected that you will attend classes regularly and work collaboratively in problem solving sessions and individual and group-based reflections on project based and cross-disciplinary issues.

Overview of Learning Resources

RMIT will provide you with resources and tools for learning in this course through our online systems.

Overview of Assessment

You will be assessed on how well you meet the course’s learning outcomes.

Task 1: Group presentation: Focusing on one housing related health risk, critically reflect on and discuss how each group member’s discipline addresses the issue and provisionally suggest a strategy that may address this problem and optimise health. 20% weighting. CLO1, CLO2.

Task 2: Group work: Working collaboratively and applying the concepts, theories and skills from the course, respond to one housing related challenge with a recommendation that optimises health. The output that is produced will be negotiable and may include a city/neighbourhood/building design brief, a proposal for policy reform or a change in professional practice or education. 40% weighting. CLO1, CLO2, CLO3, CLO4

Task 3: Individual work: Reflective journal. Critically reflect on your learning in the Housing & Health course. Showcase how this learning has helped generate new forms of knowledge and innovative solutions, and how this may inform your future practices. 40% weighting. CLO2, CLO4

Feedback will be given on all assessment tasks. 

If you have a long term medical condition and/or disability it may be possible to negotiate to vary aspects of the learning or assessment methods. You can contact the program coordinator or Equitable Learning Services if you would like to find out more. 

Your course assessment conforms to RMIT assessment principles, regulations, policies, procedures and instructions.