Immersive learning at Sparks, Bristol

Pykett, Jessica; Facer, Keri; Jones, Verity

Abstract

Sparks is a centre for sustainability, creativity and education in Bristol. It is located in a large building
formerly occupied by Marks & Spencer in the Broadmead precinct, a retail area in the city centre. Sparks
is run by a collaboration between Global Goals Centre and Artspace Lifespace. It engages the public with
the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals through its ‘department store with a difference’,
events and educational workshops, and through the provision of creative community arts, rehearsal and
performance spaces.
This report summarises the results of a case study of Sparks conducted by the Learning domain research team at the Centre for Sociodigital Futures and the Education Lead at Sparks, from December 2023 to August 2024.
The aim of this research project was to examine the role of publicly accessible immersive spaces (whether physical or digital), which bring people together and invite them to imagine other futures. This is, to our knowledge, the first academic research project to analyse Sparks as an empirical case study.
We found that Sparks is enacting the future that it desires and functions as a ‘meanwhile space’, which
serves a public value of collective learning. We highlight ways in which thinking about immersion, futures, digital technologies and community building could be used to enhance the educational goals of the space. The research observations were coded with the themes of site observations, immersion, digital, imagination, futures, sustainability and community. We discuss findings on each of these in turn and include some methodological reflections.

• Report Type: Research Report
• Online Publication Date: Mar 13, 2025
• Publication Date: Mar 13, 2025
• Deposit Date: Mar 13, 2025
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/13940914