Learning for creativity: the creative economy festival as an ecosystem for collaborative construction

Abstract

Creative learning is a pedagogical approach that values student protagonism, experimentation, and the collaborative construction of knowledge. Aligned with the principles of maker culture, this perspective proposes “learning by doing” as the central axis of the educational process, promoting environments in which practice, error, and co-authorship are understood as an essential part of meaningful learning. In this context, this article aims to investigate how the integration between creative learning and maker culture can enhance university education, using the Creative Economy Festival of the Universidade Católica de Brasília (UCB) as an object of analysis. Developed within the scope of undergraduate courses and the Postgraduate Program in Innovation in Communication and Creative Economy at UCB, the event constitutes a living laboratory of experimentation, in which teaching, research, and extension are coordinated in collaborative and interdisciplinary practices. The activities create spaces for collective creation and the resolution of real challenges. The experience promotes inter-learning between different levels of education and fosters the integration of art, technology, and innovation, principles that are reaffirmed in what is believed to be a practice for creative education and learning. Using descriptive research with document analysis, the investigation presented here concludes that the Creative Economy Festival embodies the principles of creative learning in training and self-training processes, transforming the university space into a dynamic ecosystem of innovation, collaboration, and knowledge production, in which the articulation of knowledge and practice initiated in the classroom materializes in the construction of collective knowledge and real solutions.