Fast 48 @ 10” visual-rich report ready for viewing

The Taylor Center Research & Scholarship (R&S) team identified the long-running “Fast 48” design thinking weekend workshop as a priority for internal program review back in 2017. When this internal learning process started, the tenth Fast 48 was just coming up, and in March 2020, the twelfth Fast 48 workshop ran. Today, we are releasing this visual-rich report.

The program review aimed to learn from participants and stakeholders and improve the workshop. The R&S team reached out to almost 300 Fast 48 alum via a short survey and selected interview. The report authors wondered: Did the workshop cultivate skills and interest to use design thinking? Did it cultivate changemakers? What can be improved? (Thanks to people who responded! And apologies if we did not have a chance to interview you.)

The report ended up being 44 pages with quotes and lots of photos to convey what respondents’ took away—like the value of empathy (see quote insert).

Rapid prototyping also came up a lot (see photo, a team’s presentation during a 2016 Fast 48 workshop).

Participants also offered critical feedback and suggestions to improve preparation for community engagement portion.

Going forward, we look forward to hearing more from you about how your experiences at Taylor Center (since 2014) or Tulane social innovation programming (since 2009) helped advance your changemaking skills.

Read more about the R&S team’s work to support research in and on social innovation, and research itself as a path to changemaking.

We also look forward future iterations of the Fast 48 and. Other accessible, low-cost ways to learn skills in design thinking (DT) for changemaking efforts of all types.  Check out DT programs at Taylor here.

Written by the Taylor Research & Scholarship Team