Teaching Beyond the Curriculum

Abstract

“Most learning is not the result of instruction. It is rather the result of unhampered participation in a meaningful setting.” Ivan Illich While the four walls of a classroom provide an ideal space for conventional pedagogies within academia, however, when examining wicked problems or systemic issues in design, it becomes imperative to go beyond the conventional framework to situate teaching within the very context from where the wicked problems emerge. The proposed presentation describes the structuring of classrooms that are directly embedded within urban ecosystems designed specifically for a social design class that examines issues like sustainability, food desert/food insecurity, diversity and exclusion, homelessness, and the digital divide. Serving as living labs, these lived, urban environments provide credible multi-stakeholder participation, co-creation, and sustainable solutions that result from iterative processes that students engage in while working collaboratively with community partners, local governments, grassroots organizations, and the community. The course explores scaffolded research methodologies that are used to create effective ways of understanding community engagement when working with diverse communities. Course outcomes include the development of proficiencies in the areas of design research, design thinking, problem framing, and providing sustainable solutions. But more importantly, the proficiencies focus on building cultural competencies, helping develop an understanding of modes of engagement using participatory methods, use of ethical practices in trust-building specifically when working with underserved populations, understanding social identities through the lens of power and privilege, and constructions of power structures and how these impact the understanding of the systemic issues being examined.