Last year I had the honour to work as learning architecture agent at Leuphana University of Lüneburg. Recently a short video about the project transformation::spaces for future-oriented learning (TRAFOS) was released, giving insights into their evolution:
Next to the video, also a handbook just got published with participatory methods on how to delve into the process of collaboratively designing learning spaces, together with the main target group: students!
However, let me tell you from the perspective of a learning architecture agent as well as an „instructor“: Everybody involved can learn a lot! I feel comfortable to say that co-creation in the TRAFOS did not only lead to a physical transformation of space but to personal transformations, too. People realised the potential, the power, they have and the one that lies within collaboration! Years back I came across the saying „Nobody can do everything but everybody can do something.“ So co-creation is where magic happens!
Competencies reveal themselves in practice, in the doing. The TRAFOS have become a spot on campus where ideas can be shared in a safe space. Where ideas can be nurtured by the people who randomly pass by or meet there on purpose. A student of my course „Growing Together“ brought the following to my attention:
ACT = Action Changes Things.
YES! By having a space to show to ourselves what we are capable of, individually and collectively, as students or as teachers – that’s valuable if we want to courageously co-create our future, starting where we are.