A Qualitative Understanding of the Critical Opinion and Environmental Values of College Students meeting the Young-Wall Dam Issue

영월댐 건설 문제를 둘러 싼 환경교육과 학생들의 비판적 견해와 환경가치에 대한 정성적 이해

An environmentally hot issue has arisen from the plan of Young-Wall Dam Construction at Tong river in Korea lately. The point at issue is which value is bigger between the water conservation for human use in future and the ecosystem protection for the intrinsic value of nature including animals and plants there. The purpose of this study is in the qualitative understanding of college students' critical thinking ability and opinion and the environmental values of them through the analysis of their writings. Various environmental values written in the 7th revised national curriculum of Korea are used as a criteria to investigate students' environmental values in their written opinions. Various environmental values are shown up to be handled such as the anthropocentrism, ecocentrism, pro-technology etc. Students of Dept. of Environment Teaching in the Kongju National University are the subject of this study. It shows that they have a deep understanding of the Young-Wall Dam issue and assert their opinions objectively and critically. Most of them(89.5%, n=17) are against the constructional plan of the Young-Wall Dam. Students who are for the plan are proved to have pro-technology value only and the others who are against to have various values including deer ecology.