From Stories to Systems: A Participatory Design Intervention for Student Wellbeing in Under-Resourced China
October 22, 2025
This project explores participatory storytelling as a tool to reshape student well-being within the regimented K-12 education system in China. Responding to rising mental health challenges, it critiques how schools often equate adapting to rigid structures with well-being. Collaborating with a middle school in Guigang, the project developed a four-component framework to amplify student voices. It offers a replicable model to surface student stories as a bridge between lived experience and systemic action in constrained educational environments, reframing the
narrative around student well-being.
Designer: Polly Xu and Xuanxuan Huang
