Abstract

Through the case study of the establishment of a Community Learning Centre (CLC) in a remote, rural Anglophone community in Quebec, this thesis proposes a positive example for education for sustainable development for those wishing to explore the implementation of a similar project. The thesis design evolved towards a hybrid framework of Appreciative Inquiry (AI) to recognize, leverage and build upon existing knowledge, resources and capacities both locally and through videoconferencing afforded by the local school obtaining a CLC status. The first three years of the CLC implementation are then evaluated through a formal process embedded in the CLC framework. The findings are grouped under three categories: school community partnerships, access to educational and lifelong learning opportunities, and student engagement, success and well being. The researcher is a native of the CLC community under study who returned back to her birth community after an absence of twenty years. The two research questions about the impacts of the development and implementation of a Community Learning Centre and collaborative learning and inquiry are supported and illustrated by the findings. The third research question concerns the impact of the familiarity of the researcher with the community of the research site. This is illustrated through the story of a personal journey and deemed to be positive, taking into consideration the clear statement of researcher biases and careful examinations and corrections of these biases through appreciative inquiry, cultivating collaboration and recognizing capacity.