Creativity and the Student Voice: Undergraduate Scholarship and Literary Translation

This article explores the benefits and challenges of student-staff collaboration in an extracurricular project titled ‘Translating Literary Texts for Publication’, part of the Undergraduate Scholars Programme (USP) at the author’s institution. The USP is a non-credit bearing initiative launched in 2018 that aligns with the ‘4Cs’ of 21st-century learning: creativity, communication, collaboration, and critical thinking. Student feedback consistently highlights the benefits of working across disciplines and achieving concrete outcomes like publications, posts in institutional blogs and similar, which also boost their CVs.<br/>The project allows students to take the lead in creating a special issue of ‘Il Pietrisco Translations’ journal by selecting themes and texts, formulating research questions, developing translation strategies, and engaging in peer review. The creativity inherent in literary translation itself (O’Sullivan 2013; Rossi, 2018) is of course at the core of the project. However, through this hands-on experience, students develop creative and critical thinking, as well as valuable competences such as digital literacy, editorial and teamwork that enhance their employability and academic development.<br/>Scholarly studies support the value of such extracurricular activities in promoting student creativity and readiness for the job market (Uigín et al., 2015; Purkarthofer &amp; Mäntysalo, 2022; Bansal &amp; Dignard, 2023). While student-led journals have gained popularity, particularly in the sciences, interest is growing in the humanities and social sciences (Moore &amp; Wigdorowitz, 2025). These projects also benefit staff by increasing student motivation, encouraging excellence, fostering collaboration with colleagues and external partners, and strengthening institutional networks.<br/>The article raises the question of whether such extracurricular initiatives could - or should -be integrated into the formal curriculum. While embedding them could provide humanities students with practical experience and assessable outcomes, their success may lie in the freedom they offer outside traditional academic constraints. The article concludes by suggesting ways to better integrate student creativity and voice into Modern Languages curricula, while preserving the innovative spirit of extracurricular learning.