This article presents the Pilgrimage Model as a template for educators wishing to lead students on site-specific studies of engaged learning. During the 2015–2016 academic year, a group of Georgetown University students, faculty, and staff pursued the Pilgrimage Project, a year-long pedagogical experiment in interdisciplinary education and speculative design. Students researched Georgetown’s historic Old North building from a variety of disciplinary angles and presented the results of their collective research in an on-site multimedia exhibit. The article analyzes the Pilgrimage Project from a practical perspective, as an effective means of delivering robust educational experiences, and from a theoretical perspective, as an example of speculative method in education research. As a model of interdisciplinary education, the Pilgrimage Model effectively merges disciplinary-specific course goals, in-depth student-led research, and student skill development in digital design and multimedia production.
AugerJ (2013) Speculative design: Crafting the speculation. Digital Creativity24(1): 11–35.
2.
Bardzell J and Bardzell S (2013) What is ‘critical’ about critical design? In: Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on human factors in computing systems – CHI ’13. New York: ACM, pp.3297–3306.
3.
Bardzell S, Bardzell J, Forlizzi J, et al. (2012) Critical design and critical theory : The challenge of designing for provocation. In: Proceedings of the designing interactive systems conference, New York: ACM, pp.288–297. DOI: 10.1145/2317956.2318001.
4.
BarronBChenM (2008) Teaching for meaningful learning: A review of research on inquiry-based and cooperative learning. In: BarronBLindaD-H (eds) Powerful Learning: What We Know About Teaching for Understanding, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, pp. 11–70.
5.
BellG (2005) Making by making strange: Defamiliarization and the design of domestic technologies. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction12(2): 149–173.
6.
BiestaG (2007) Why ‘What Works’ won’t work: Evidence-based practice and the democratic deficit in educational research. Educational Theory57(1): 1–22.
7.
Bonwell CC and Eison JA (1991) Active learning: Creating excitement in the classroom. ASHEERIC Higher Education Report No. 1, George Washington University, Washington, DC.
8.
Bowker G and Star SL (1999) Sorting Things Out: Classification and its Consequences. Cambridge: The MIT Press.
Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship (CNDLS) (2013) Initiative on technology-enhanced learning. Georgetown University. Available at: https://itel.georgetown.edu (accessed 1 May 2017).
11.
Disalvo C and Lukens J (2009) Towards a critical technological fluency : The confluence of speculative design and community technology programs. In: Proceedings of the digital arts and culture conference, 2009: After media: Embodiment and context, Irvine, CA: University of California, pp.1–6.
12.
DunneARabyF (2013) Speculative Everything: Design, Fiction and Social Dreaming, Cambridge: The MIT Press.
13.
GonzattoRFvan AmstelFMCMerkleLE, et al.(2013) The ideology of the future in design fictions. Digital Creativity24(1): 36–45.
14.
Kadish L (2015) “Digital accessibility and the senses.” In: Museum computer network (MCN) 2015 – The invisible architectures of connected museums: Making meaning with people, collections, and information, Minneapolis, MN, 4–7 November, 2015.
15.
KolbDA (2015) Experiential Learning: Experience as the Source of Learning and Development, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.
16.
LewinK (1946) Action research and minority problems. Journal of Social Issues2(4): 34–46.
17.
LukensJDiSalvoC (2012) Speculative Design and Technological Fluency. IJLM Massachusetts Institute of Technology3(4): 23–40.
18.
LuryCWakefordN (2012) Inventive Methods: The Happening of the Social, London: Routledge.
19.
Mäenpää H, Tarkoma S and Vihavainen A (2015) Blending problem- and project-based learning in internet of things education : Case greenhouse maintenance. In: Proceedings of the 46th ACM technical symposium on computer science education. New York: ACM pp.398–403.
20.
Matsuo B and Yuasa N (1966). The Narrow Road to the Deep North: And Other Travel Sketches. The Penguin Classics.
21.
MichaelJ (2006) Where is the evidence that active learning works?Advances in Physiological Education30: 159–167.
22.
OsbornJR (2017) Letters of Light: Arabic Script in Calligraphy, Print, and Digital Design, Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Pilgrimage Project (2016a) The Pilgrimage Project Guidebook, Washington DC: Georgetown University.
25.
Pilgrimage Project (2016b) The Pilgrimage Project Website. Washington DC: Georgetown University. Available at: http://oldnorth.georgetown.domains (accessed 30 September 2017).
26.
PrinceM (2004) Does active-learning work? A review of the research. Journal of Engineering Education93(3): 223–231.
27.
RabyF (2008) Critical design. In: ErlhoffMMarhsallT (eds) Design Dictionary: Perspectives on Design Terminology, Basel: Birkhäuser Architecture, pp. 94–96.
28.
Ross J (2016) Speculative method in digital education research. Learning, Media and Technology 9884 (April): 1–16.
29.
SeagoADunneA (1999) New methodologies in art and design research: The object as discourse. Design Issues15(2): 11–17.
30.
SolnitR (2006) A Field Guide to Getting Lost, New York: Penguin Publishing Group.
31.
StarSLGriesemerJR (1989) Institutional ecology, ’translations’ and boundary objects: Amateurs and professionals in Berkeley’s museum of vertebrate zoology, 1907-39. Social Studies of Science19(3): 387–420.
