Hi Barbara,
Though the project I'm thinking of footprinting is for heavy duty mechanics I sense a similarity in releasing students into a real and unpredictable public health environment. Connections and solutions are poorly indexed, certainly unplanned and that tried may not work. Just the not working could be a course of study in itself.
The original contract on the mechanics project called for training diagnostic specialists adept at collecting data on high-value, remotely-placed and broken production equipment. The mechanic would be asked to build from field information a repair strategy and then send a field crew to the breakdown location. The idea was to create a level of expert in remote sensing and team communication to monitor a number of repairs by satellite connection and hopefully reduce time on the ground costs and encourage skill retention by allowing top mechanics to work in the office instead of on-site.
It was thought there was too much ambiguity in the process to "teach" this subject but my experience in onsite repair is that problems arise mostly from not being in mental or physical proximity to the breakdown. The mental connection is where communication between mechanic and expert observational field assistant comes in—a kind of imaginary synchronization partnership. (Try and sell the idea that failure of the mechanics imagination caused a miss-diagnosis on something as seemingly simple as a machine. And don’t ever mention “empathy.” Not ever).
A field practicum outside the safely of structured learning plans and expert back-up sounds very emergent! "Wild" is a good term. Interested to see your results.