At the end of fall semester 2024, Honors College students in WRA 291H, Understanding Impacts: Addressing Inequity to Create Social Justice, showcased their semester-long work in an inspiring exhibition titled Creative Impact. The event highlighted students’ creative responses to social justice issues, collaboratively developed through coursework and community engagement in the Greater Lansing area.
The Course
Led by Professor Nancy DeJoy and Graduate Assistant Sophia Maggio, the course was designed to help students explore the intersections of creativity, social justice, and community-engaged research. Students worked directly with local nonprofits while using creative practices to reflect on their experiences and develop their capacities as “creative change agents.”
The course challenged students to wrestle with a central question: What does it mean to be a creative change agent? Throughout the semester, readings such as Wait, What? by Jim Ryan and How to Be an Explorer of the World by Keri Smith guided students in cultivating curiosity, empathy, and reflection. Exercises from How to Be an Explorer of the World encouraged students to see creativity not as a rare talent, but as a critical tool for navigating and transforming their lives and communities.
Students engaged in community-based learning at the Refugee Development Center, Allen Neighborhood Center, and Homeless Angels, where students grappled with real-world challenges and connected their academic work to pressing social justice issues such as food insecurity, refugee support, and homelessness. “Integrating creativity was the innovation, along with having students engage at different sites where they could see how sources of inequity and social injustice—like economic issues and institutional racism—intersected across spaces such as schools,” said DeJoy.
Maggio emphasized the importance of integrating creativity into students’ understanding of social change. “As they interacted with both their coursework and experiences at the sites, we best supported students in writing their research papers by encouraging them to think more creatively. One term we used frequently throughout the course was ‘creative change agent,’ which helped them explore how they could affect social change through their work in creative ways,” she noted. By encouraging imaginative approaches, the course empowered students to think beyond conventional solutions and develop innovative strategies for advocacy.
Professor DeJoy and Maggio emphasized how the course pushed back against traditional academic and activist frameworks. By centering creativity and fostering student-led inquiry, the course disrupted hierarchical models of knowledge production and encouraged students to bring their whole selves into their work.
The Showcase
The Creative Impact showcase was a culmination of students’ explorations, reflections, and engagement with community partners. The event featured a wide range of creative media, including visual art, poetry, installations, and multimedia presentations. The exhibit not only showcased student creativity, but also highlighted their commitment to addressing inequities through innovative and impactful strategies.
The Creative Impact showcase and WRA 291H course exemplify the potential of creative activism in academic spaces. By combining rigorous inquiry, artistic expression, and community engagement, the program not only equipped students with new tools for advocacy but also inspired them to see themselves as agents of change.
The Impact
As students worked with different organizations, students identified shared structural sources of inequity, from systemic racism to economic disparities. The diversity of nonprofit sites allowed for rich conversations about how these issues intersect across different spaces.
DeJoy noted that traditional service-learning models often focus on direct aid or research. In contrast, the Understanding Impacts class invited students to explore the imaginative possibilities of creative activism. “We wanted them to think beyond conventional methods and consider how creativity could be a powerful tool for social change,” she explained.
A central theme throughout the course was hope—not as naive optimism, but as a grounded belief in the possibility of change. DeJoy and Maggio were intentional about fostering a sense of hope, even as students confronted difficult histories and structural injustices.
“Hope,” DeJoy explained, “benefits everyone. It fosters authenticity, and we don’t want people who come from those experiences to feel like those experiences are negligible.” This message resonated deeply with students, many of whom reflected on how the course helped them see the potential for creative and collaborative solutions to social challenges.
Maggio highlighted the power of fostering a sense of place, encouraging students to see themselves as active members of their broader community, not just their campus bubble. “The structure of this course does a great job of connecting creative change agency—whether you call it creative activism or something else—to students’ sense of place.” she noted.
For DeJoy, validating students’ different experiences and empowering them to use their voices was crucial. “Some students faced difficult realizations, while others who had experienced sources of inequity felt empowered to be open about their experiences. They were able to offer valuable insights into the actual realities and effects of those inequities, such as students who were immigrants, for example,” she explained.
Both Dejoy and Maggio underscored the importance of building relationships with community partners and creating assignments that push students to think critically and imaginatively about their roles as change agents. They also emphasized the need for educators to model hope and resilience, demonstrating that meaningful change is possible even in the face of daunting challenges.
As higher education continues to navigate questions about its role in addressing social challenges, courses like Understanding Impacts: Addressing Inequity to Create Social Justice offer a powerful model for how creativity, hope, and community can transform both students and the world around them.
