Innovating to Build and Support an Inclusive DiscoverDesign Community
Supporting high school teachers through a toolkit introducing DiscoverDesign and the design process

In the past year CAF not only overhauled DiscoverDesign.org in response to student, teacher and mentor feedback, we also conducted an extensive analysis of the patterns of participation of our users. This evaluation, combined with data from Chicago City of Learning (CCOL), provided benchmark data that informed the development of this proposal. Two opportunities emerged from this analysis:
1. With access to data about our users we can begin to be more strategic about targeting teachers and schools as an intervention strategy to create access to design thinking for young people who otherwise might not have the opportunity to develop this skill.
2. Existing users most often integrate DiscoverDesign directly into their classroom teaching plans. This is a powerful opportunity because it ensures ongoing exposure for students and a high degree of retention once a teacher becomes part of the community. However, it is challenging for prospective users to understand DiscoverDesign features, the ways the design process supports state, local and national standards and how to most effectively integrate DiscoverDesign into classroom practice.
In short, we need tools to support teachers to integrate DiscoverDesign into their current classroom teaching.
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