Positioning for Youth Agency in Youth Co-Design of Digital Badges

• In Event: Learning Environments for Fostering Agency and Learner Identity

Abstract

Youth co-design has the potential to involve youth in the design of learning environments in meaningful ways. However, depending on adult participation, youth co-design processes also can unintentionally reproduce normative forms of power and learning. This paper describes practices adult participants engaged in during youth co-design in order to a) support youth agentic participation in the co-design process, and b) support the design of badges that represent youth learning and participation in the program. This paper documents the youth co-design of a digital badge system that represented participation in a youth volunteer program at an aquarium where youth volunteers interpret exhibits for aquarium patrons.

Authors

• Karissa Pickrell, California State University - Fullerton

• Gavin Tierney, California State University - Fullerton