Transforming the Instructional Landscape: Becoming Trusted Partners in Classroom (Re)design
University of Toronto (UofT) community members spend so much time in classrooms, whether they are learning, teaching, or supporting those who do. But classroom design does not always reflect what they need from their teaching and learning environments, especially as educational practices evolve. To ensure classrooms are designed for the needs of all who use them, we worked with the Academic and Campus Events (ACE). We hope that our insights, alongside the key theme of building trust, will help TIL to build a consultation process that celebrates collaborative design and uses it to create humanfriendly instructional spaces.
Fall/Winter 2019-2020
How can we continue to be trusted partners in class (re)design?
To answer this question, TIL researchers employed a variety of research methodologies, including long-form interviews and journey-mapping sessions, to understand how the classroom re-design process works in a university setting, and how design researchers can help ensure that classroom design continues to reflect what students and instructors need from teaching and learning environments.
KEY FINDINGS
We found that the key to community collaboration is trust. By establishing relations of trust with stakeholders, TIL can deliver both a better classroom experience and a better classroomdesign experience. Further, it can be a leader in connecting often-siloed groups at UofT. Under the banner of trust, we further organize our insights into three key themes:
- Trust Through Transparency: encourages designers to give stakeholders a window into the design process
- Owning The Process: describes the attachment stakeholders feel to their working and learning spaces.
- Playing to Strengths: reveals the benefits of giving participants clearly delineated roles and responsibilities
