Mobilizing Creativity in Education: From Attention to the Conditions of Possibility

Creativity researchers have responded to early calls to fill gaps in the literature, and creativity is now considered a 21st-century competency across education policy and curricula. Yet naming it has not led to broad integration across education, and the rapid adoption of GenAI has complicated how we understand creativity. We treat “mobilization” as an analytical concept and offer a framework that identifies four points at which creativity fails to mobilize and reach teaching in practice: conception, pathway, conditions, and mechanism. We draw on a case study of five undergraduate instructors at a Canadian research university, showing a lack of training and support to develop and implement creative teaching approaches. We match this with OECD survey data from across ninety jurisdictions. We also examine historical contexts relevant to the mobilization problem and unpack some realities of GenAI and creativity in education. Our evidence and analytic framework show that mobilization requires considering the underlying issues. This paper gives creativity advocates clarity on how to ask for support and how to engage program developers, policymakers, and faculty heads.