“Stepping in and stepping out”: Enabling creative third spaces through transdisciplinary partnerships

This article explores how transformative higher education approaches can be fostered through an integration of the concepts of third space, Students as Partners (SaP), and transdisciplinarity in practical contexts. We describe a collaborative enquiry that engaged staff and students in a reflexive dialogue centred on the concepts of mutual learning, liminality, emergence, and creativity as enacted in the curriculum of a transdisciplinary undergraduate degree, the Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation (BCII) at the University of Technology Sydney in Australia. The key insights that emerged through this enquiry were: third spaces in curriculum can be enabled but not constructed, all parties need to embrace uncertainty and a mutual learning mindset, and that “stepping in and out” of such fluid liminal spaces can stimulate creativity. Based on our experience and exploration, we offer some practical recommendations to those seeking to create similar enabling conditions for third spaces in their own undergraduate programs.