Engagement with students is becoming an increasingly difficult part of teaching. Whether it is maintaining their attention and engagement, finding ways to motivating them in the classroom, or making the material relevant to students' lives, teachers must find different ways to engage students in the classroom. One approach to combat student disengagement is using interdisciplinary learning, a teaching style that incorporates two or more areas of study to create authentic projects and strengthen understanding (Jacobsen, Lock, & Friesen, 2015). Research has shown that interdisciplinary learning has increased concept retention, engagement, and student understanding (Jacobsen, Lock, & Friesen, 2015). This is because the connection between two or more disciplines allows students to scaffold information in multiple different subjects, strengthening their understanding of both subjects at the same time. This allows for students to create a strong neural network of interconnected concepts and allow a more worldly view of science, humanities, and human understanding. 

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Interdisciplinary projects create authentic learning environments for students and allow them to see the real-world applications of their learning (Science Education Resource Center, n.d.). By incorporating the Gallileo’s Understanding by Design outline (McTighe & Wiggins, 2012), our project will expose students to many real-world scenarios, foster critical thought, bring experts into the classroom to speak with students, and allow the freedom to explore topics of intrinsic interest (Friesen, 2015). This also creates environments for teamwork between departments, allowing teachers the ability to focus on their subject curriculum but in a larger picture project. This fostering of critical thought not only allows students to see how the world is interconnected, but also gives students the opportunity to see how teamwork between disciplines is necessary for the advancement of our modern world. 

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A wicked problem in the world is the underlying idea that art and science cannot coexist in the same realm. This creates two problems: students are learning that disciplines must be separated from one another; and that the real-world views science and art as two separate entities. This however is not the case as art and science are always merged, melded, and linked to one another, and the growth in each field could be exponentially changed if they were harmoniously placed together. Our project challenges the idea that science and art are two separate entities. This normalization of juxtaposition creates a sense of complacency when the two are melded together as some kind of mental exercise: therefore, our wicked problem is unifying the two in students' perception of learning, as this in itself is a wicked enough task.