Faculty holding yellow and light blue spherical objects.
Discovery Experiences represent the most transformative forms of scholarly and experiential learning, and powerfully express what it means to receive an education at a major public research university in the 21st century.

What is Discovery?

The Berkeley Discovery Initiative is a campus-wide effort to transform undergraduate education, and support students on a journey of engaged creativity and self-actualization. The “Discovery Arc” will begin the moment students arrive on campus as they are introduced to a creative vision of higher education. The journey will continue as students are invited into immersive and inquiry-driven learning across the curriculum. The arc will culminate with a personalized discovery project, whether original research, artistic production, entrepreneurial initiative, or community-engaged service. Ultimately, Berkeley Discovery aims to instill a life-long ethos of engaging with grand challenges, fostering creativity, and journeying toward innovation.

Learn more about Berkeley Discovery here. 

 

What is Creative Discovery?

Aligned with the core values of Berkeley Discovery, Creative Discovery experiences will require students to face challenges of conceptualization, design, planning, and implementation; build new, and hone existing, creative skills; and participate in structured reflection throughout the act of creation.  

The core goals of Creative Discovery are to: 

- CONNECT students to our many creative departments, museums, artistic venues and advising resources; integrate learning with artistic exposure through the Arts Passport, Flex Pass, Maker Pass, Film Passes, and the offline and online platforms of many campus and regional museums, theaters, making spaces, and creative clubs.

- Allow students to DISCOVER across disciplines and skill-sets, activating engagement across two or more creative forms; increasing enrollment when possible in creative courses to non-majors; mobilizing the Adobe Creative Suite, Artivive, or other technological tools to enhance and scale creative pedagogy; connecting technically-focused courses with deeper cultural, historical, and philosophical themes; and/or joining creative experimentation to Science, Technology, Engineering, Math, and Medicine (S.T.E.M./M.) disciplines and other research themes of our public university (e.g. the future of Democracy, Social Justice, Racial and Gender Equity, Climate, Health, Sustainable Cities, and more.)

- Let students ENGAGE creatively with local schools, community organizations, regional arts partners, or inspiring artists, designers, and cultural leaders, providing rigor and enhancement to curricular, DeCal, and co-curricular experiences in arts-based public service, cultural internships, community design projects, arts education, cultural criticism, curation, and urban arts engagement in the region.

- REFLECT meaningfully and inventively through critical writing, curated exhibition, artist statements, showcases, digital formats, portfolios, and public programming.