Designing a Fellowship Experience
OVERVIEW
How might we enable a museum to build their capacity by using the community’s power to design for social change?
ROLE
Design Researcher
Instructional Designer, Content Designer, Communication Design
May 2017 - September 2018
Background
The Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA) is a non-traditional museum that defines design as a creative process that inspires change, transforms lives and makes the world a better place. Their mission is to advance the understanding and appreciation of design as the convergence of creativity and functionality through exhibitions, education, and programming for visitors of all ages. While traditional Museums ask visitors to accept authoritative institutional interpretations of objects through exhibiting the outcomes, MODA creates space for change to happen. Being a forward-thinking design museum that is developing its identity as a center for social change, MODA needed to reposition the focus of their programs.
Design an experience that inspires visitors to envision a better future and then to advocate for (or demand) the design that can bring change.
Process

Design Response
We designed a new fellowship experience for MODA. The program's goal was to expand MODA’s audience to a younger generation of individuals who are passionate about social issues and create a community of advocates that embody MODA’s culture and values. MODA’s Fellowship program is aimed at demystifying design as an everyday practice that paves the way for change. In order to better link what happens inside their walls (exhibitions and programs) with that’s happening outside, the fellowship program was designed to change the structure of the museum by inviting unexpected experts and cultivating young leaders in, who seek ways to organize and implement community-driven design projects that have real-world impact.