Help Grow a Movement in Active Learning at Radford

The Wicked Festival - based on problem-based learning, research, teamwork and presentation - gives Radford University students outstanding learning opportunities and is rapidly growing each year!

Hear students describe the Wicked Festival

 

The Wicked Festival is a movement that puts real-world problem-solving at the heart of the Radford student experience.

Through this immersive, hands-on learning initiative, students across various majors work in teams to tackle today’s most complex public challenges—what is referred to as “wicked problems.” From day one, they research, brainstorm, and collaborate to develop bold, creative solutions.

In just a few short years, Wicked Festival has tripled in size. This fall, over 570 students from 23 courses shared their work with peers, faculty, and community leaders at a dynamic, conference-style showcase in the Artis Center for Adaptive Innovation and Creativity.

With your support, the College of Humanities and Behavioral Sciences can grow this experience even further—expanding resources, enhancing student participation, and deepening community impact.

From international presentations to student-led toolkits and a new academic minor, Wicked Initiatives is empowering Highlanders to be agents of change—on campus and around the world.

Give now to fuel this transformative learning experience. Help our students do more, think deeper, and lead boldly.

Political science professor and chief organizer of the event, Paige Tan, said, “The Wicked Festival is becoming more than a once-a-semester event. It's become a movement to center public problem-solving in the student learning experience at Radford. Wicked Fest builds skills in problem-solving, teamwork and public presentation.”

The Wicked Festival and its associated initiatives were inspired by Paul Hanstedt's book, Creating Wicked Students: Designing Courses for a Complex World.  Dr. Tan and other Radford faculty have taken the concept a step further, creating a wicked problems academic minor as well as a student Wicked Problems Society and a Wicked Problems Toolkit, a student-curated website that holds numerous artifacts and resources for understanding and teaching about wicked problems. Students from the Wicked Society have presented their work and offered workshops at United Nations conferences in Lisbon, Portugal and Berlin, Germany. These experiences empower our students to become agents of solution to the world's toughest challenges.

Your gift today will create more opportunities for Highlanders to engage Wicked Problems first-hand!