Recognizing and Fostering Moments of Liberatory Design Possibility in Youth Engineering Design Experiences

Abstract

An increased interest in expanding engineering education with youth brings with it a multitude of approaches toward developing engineering programming. In this article, I explore how developing programming for the purpose of fostering liberatory design offers a means of supporting young people in both personally consequential and technically relevant design work. Qualitatively following community-based engineering design work with seven Youth of Color over 3 years of observation and interview, I document how flexible front-end design work aided in moments of liberatory design possibility. Subsequently, these moments supported these young peoples' connection engineering and their engagement in canonically recognizable design work. My work reinforces and expands recent work that calls for youth-centered, justice-oriented engineering work beyond tech-specific experiences. Further, youths' experiences raise questions about the development of future engineering experiences for all young people, not just those seeking to pursue engineering.