Getting started

Imagine a school where all learning and action was driven by student ideas for positive change? Imagine if all stakeholders had access to design opportunities that students cared about?

That's what The Student Design Project aims to do.

Overview: The Student Design Project is a flexible framework that can be used with different types of groups in a school setting. Ideally, the whole student body of a school would work through the framework to create a substantial list of design opportunities. You will need to find a dedicated time for students to find design opportunities, define their ideas, and then share them using a digital collaboration tool such as Padlet. This page will outline each stage in the process.

Finding Opportunity

Goal: Give students a chance to find design opportunities that are meaningful to them and their school community.

How: To begin, set aside time for students to explore their community to help them uncover design opportunities. This opportunity scavenger hunt will help them look closely at their designed world and find ways it could be improved. The general essential question they are answering is:

What could we (re)design to make our community a better place?

Student Materials: Slide 2 will help organize this student-led search.

Define Ideas

Goal: To define design opportunities for presentation to the school community.

How: Students will first define their ideas. They will include:

• What is the opportunity?
• Why does it matter?
• Picture of environment where the opportunity exists.

Student Materials: Slide 3 will help organize their ideas before they place them on the school's digital collaborative space.

Share and Determine Importance

Goal: To create a collection of design opportunities available to all community stakeholders. Through upvoting, community members will see what ideas matter most.

How (Part 1): School leaders will create a shared Padlet available to all students. To help navigate through the ideas, here are some suggested design categories: Beautification, Environmental, Inclusivity, Functionality, Miscellaneous, etc. Next, students will collaborate and add their design opportunities to the Padlet.

How (Part 2): Allow students time to read through the design opportunities of their peers and upvote ideas that would make a significant impact in the community. The result will be an extensive list of ideas that matter to students.

Student Materials: Slide 4 shows an example of what could be included on the Padlet.

Take Action

Goal: Provide opportunities for students to create change by selecting design opportunities and finding solutions.

How: This portion of the framework can take many forms depending on the context where it is being applied. Here are some ways to incorporating design opportunities in the school community:

• Classes: Teachers select a design opportunity to explore for a project-based learning unit of study.
• Clubs: Service clubs select a design opportunity that aligns with their mission.
• Student Council: This framework allows student council to get information about school improvement ideas from the student body, and perhaps based initiatives off of this information.
• Passion Projects, Genius Hour, etc: Sometimes students struggle with finding ideas for these types of projects. The Padlet could be an excellent resource to find an opportunity students find interesting.
• Parent Advisory Board: Parents find a substantial design opportunity that align with the skills and resources of the group.
• Administration: Some design opportunities found on the Padlet might only be feasible with professional planning and a substantial budget. Student ideas could be incorporated into school-improvement planning.

Share Success

Goal: Share and spread the word about the power of student-led design!

How: Celebrate the completion of a student project in your school setting. In addition, help encourage other aspiring designers using the hashtag #studentdesignproject on Twitter.