Designing Democratic Sustainability

This workshop series took place on 5 Fridays from September 23 – October 21, 2022.

Co-organized by the Vancouver Design Nerds, University of Toronto Scarborough, University West, Stellenbosch University and Participedia, the series was framed around practically engaging with the concepts of democracy, sustainability, and inclusion. We asked participants to explore their positionality and locality as they developed group project proposals showcased at the end of the course. Participants are empowered to leverage what is learned in the classroom to address real-life issues.

This event incorporated design thinking to facilitate interdisciplinary student exploration and collaboration, project development, and problem-solving. It consisted of one activist engagement session, two facilitated design workshops and one showcase workshop. Between design workshops, students worked together in small global teams to expand and test their design ideas.

Global Classroom organizers held office hours with each group and provided guidance and feedback to help students prepare to present their work. Groups presented their projects to faculty and civil society collaborators during the final showcase for real-world feedback.