Teaching Beyond the Curriculum

Abstract

Leonardo da Vinci was an interdisciplinary genius whose creativity and ingenuity stemmed from a lifelong obsessive passion for creating works in art, science, theater, engineering, and music, to name a few. Studies of his writings, sketchbooks, and other productions reveal a man who knew no disciplinary boundaries and whose inquisitive and analytical mind fostered ideas that responded to the complexities he observed in the world around him. Da Vinci intuitively knew that innovation arises at the intersection, not the separation, of different knowledge fields. This paper argues that novel creativity is found at that knowledge intersection Da Vinci found so irresistible and that our current academic institutions offer very little in the way of art and design programs at the undergraduate level facilitating novel creativity. Present-day art and design education relies heavily on filtering students through undergraduate programs of a single discipline. Examples include studio art, photography, architecture, graphic design, and many others. Undergraduate students are often asked to declare their college “major” before even starting classes. Novel creativity here is explored through a trans-disciplinary undergraduate design program in the United States currently teaching across design disciplines. The program is innovative in its mixing of faculty specialties, unique course structures, and hybrid teaching methods. The paper will describe a student’s experience with novel ways of making and thinking as he/she maneuvers through the program. Program outcomes, student artifacts, and post-graduation career data show the value of offering students a trans-disciplinary approach to undergraduate design education.