Children's Museum of Pittsburgh

Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh (CMP) will use a participatory design research approach to identify and reinvent educational practices that hinder a sense of belonging among minoritized visitors and staff. The project will begin with an equity audit of current and historic institutional practices at both CMP and the Madison Children’s Museum. Working groups at each site will engage with other partners, using the findings to develop a preliminary framework of learning practices focused on belonging. They then will conduct experiments designed to operationalize the learning practices and use workshops where researchers, educators, and young people swap roles and work together to study, revise, and lead educational activities that enact the learning practices. The project team will disseminate a toolkit of research activities that other sites can use to create collaboratively defined learning practices that help more learners to thrive.