SuperStudio
The Honors College SuperStudio
The educational benefits of problem-based learning, design thinking, communities of practice, and studio courses in higher education are now well documented. The Honors College SuperStudio initiative builds upon these practices to help students engage in the kinds of transdisciplinary and massively-collaborative work they will need to employ as professionals and citizens to address critical 21st century issues. The SuperStudio concept thus brings together — in one space — multiple advanced courses, each of which focus on a different critical aspect of a complex global challenge, and all of which work together toward possible coordinated solutions.
Honors College Studios Virtual Tour
Watch a virtual tour of Honors College Studios, which embodies SuperStudio, Studio+, and Discovery 2 work. This new remodeled space allows for a transformative community of practice for students to collaborate, learn, and create.
SuperStudio students enroll in one of the participating 3-credit courses and in UH 4514: Honors SuperStudio, a required co-requisite 1-credit course with a common meeting time that allows students to work together in transdisiciplinary teams to explore connections among their subjects and approaches, consider the challenges to such broadly collaborative efforts, and pursue the possibility of coordinated problem-solving.
All participating courses meet in the Honors College's SuperStudio space in Squires Student Center (formerly the Old Dominion Ballroom) to facilitate student collaboration within each section, between various sections, and among all sections as a whole. Each student gains swipe-card access to the studio and a project-development space. The Honors SuperStudio is now a vibrant transdisciplinary community of practice.
The SuperStudio initiative harnesses the work of five advanced courses in environmental policy, healthcare, emerging technologies, the future of higher education, and the future of employment to examine the challenges and potentials of the Green New Deal, an emerging framework for understanding and addressing interconnected crises in climate change and economic inequality.
Students from these courses are arranged equally in transdisciplinary teams that will meet in UH 4514: Honors SuperStudio to:
1) Consider issues and processes that apply to all transdisciplinary work, such as:
- Ethics
- Equity
- Decisions
- Problem framing
- Emergent technologies & ideas
2) Learn about the history, evolution, component initiatives, and current status of the Green New Deal through various disciplinary contexts;
3) Perform focused investigations of particular features of the Green New Deal, with the students bringing their domain-specific expertise to bear to interrogate and seek coordinated responses to issues such as:
- Universal basic needs, such as education, income, housing, health care, and elder care
- Job training for displaced fossil fuel workers
- Zero-emissions power and digitizing the power grid
- Electric vehicles and high-speed rail
For more information, please contact Dr. Nikki Lewis (lewissn@vt.edu) or Dr. Anne-Lise Velez (aknox@vt.edu).