Constellations classes integrate high-impact practices, such as hands-on projects, collaborative assignments, and service and community-based learning.
Digital Student Showcase
Spring 2026
In Constellations’ Digital Student Showcase, a selection of student projects are released from Monday, April 27 – Friday, May 8, 2026. Students in Archival Information & AI and Truth & Crime showcase their creativity, research and communication skills, and other valuable skills developed and honed in these highly interdisciplinary humanities courses. Archival Information & AI students wrote Sci-Fi stories for a class assignment and Truth & Crime students created podcasts to share their research for their final class projects.
For an assignment called, “The Future of Artificial Memory Devices,” students were asked to write a short, sci-fi story in which they imagine what reading and writing will look like half a millennium from now.
Archival Information & Artificial Intelligence explores the ways that information and data become accepted facts and knowledge. Two questions spur the conversations: How does information become intelligence? How do we record and share our knowledge across space and time? Two seemingly distinct systems of information management —dusty library archives and digital AI chatbots—will give our conversations focus and cohesion. This course is designed to give students a chance to productively confront their frustrations with information overload and to think about how to effectively navigate a range of information sources. We are drowning in data, and it can sometimes feel like our own voices—our own ways of synthesizing information and sharing knowledge —are becoming irrelevant.
The Truth & Crime Podcast Project invited students to collaboratively research and produce a podcast focused on a crime that has occurred either at UW–Madison or in the City of Madison. The podcasts are 10-15 minutes and are grounded in historical or contemporary cases. Students gathered information from archival resources, news records, or interviews, then transform their findings into compelling audio narratives.
This project was designed to engage students in an innovative, collaborative, and creative way of studying true crime narratives. Instead of only analyzing written texts, students actively participated in the process of researching, scripting, and producing their own podcasts. By working with archival materials, public records, and interviews, they gained hands-on experience in historical research and narrative construction. The project emphasizes collaboration, critical thinking, and storytelling while also introducing students to digital literacy and media production.
Three Americans (created by Erica Rosner, Ruby Schneider, and Eddie Peach-Righton) revisits the Kelly Nolan case through a blend of careful reporting and personal reflection, tracing the events of her disappearance alongside the investigation and the public speculation that followed. Drawing from local news coverage and community discussions, this student podcast not only retells the case but also reflects on its lasting impact—asking what it means to live with its proximity and what it reveals about safety, memory, and the stories we continue to piece together.
Click HERE to listen.
Shriya Ravi is a sophomore majoring in Chemistry and Data Science. Shriya wrote her short story in the voice of a robot working over four hundred years in the future and wonders if robots are capable of independent thought and feeling.
Click HERE to read her story.
Badger Prime (created by Miller Kapfhammer, and Joe Bell) combines true-crime storytelling with legal analysis to unpack a case shaped by deception, contradiction, and narrative construction. Through careful research and a chronological retelling of events, this student podcast explores not only what happened, but how concepts like mens rea, causation, and “narrative collision” help us understand the crime and its legal aftermath. Blending reporting with reflection, it invites listeners to think critically about truth, storytelling, and justice.
Click HERE to listen.
Tyler Hooper is a junior majoring in Data Science. His short story “An Old World” speculates what our development of AI might lead to, for better or for worse, including a secret world that preserves the way we learn today in 2026.
Click HERE to read Tyler’s story.
Madison Mysteries: The Sterling Hall Bombing (created by Sara Debuhr, Megan Wills, and Ojaswi Pasachhe) revisits a pivotal moment in UW–Madison history through an investigative-historical lens, tracing the bombing within the larger context of Vietnam War protest, institutional power, and political unrest. Grounded in research and shaped for audio storytelling, this student podcast explores not only the event itself, but also its aftermath, its unresolved questions, and the limits of what history can fully explain.
Click HERE to listen.
Ashley Truong is a senior studying Real Estate and Marketing with a minor in International Business. In “The Body is the Book,” she imagines a world in which reading is a truly embodied experience involving the entire physical person beyond the eyes and mind.
Click HERE to read Ashley’s story.
Hartland Tragedy (created by Carli Vermeulen and Darin Bucher) revisits a shocking Wisconsin family murder-suicide through a blend of retelling and emotional appeal, tracing how an apparently ordinary family life was shattered by violence. Balancing factual reporting with reflective storytelling, this student podcast explores the case, the questions surrounding responsibility, and the unsettling gap between public appearances and hidden realities.
Click HERE to listen.
Anya Vosberg is a freshman studying computer science. Her short story “How a Book Can Kill” is a dystopian tragedy that speculates on the disastrous directions future learning could take.
Click HERE to read Anya’s story.
Signal Lost (created by Kennedy Murton, Ella Mandel, Brooke Lieberman, and Alyssa Lansburgh) revisits a case that still lingers in Madison’s memory, not to sensationalize tragedy, but to ask difficult questions about uncertainty, institutional failure, and what justice can and cannot repair. Blending narrative storytelling with critical reflection, this student podcast examines the crime, the investigation, and the lasting gaps that remain for families, students, and communities.
Click HERE to listen.
Anna Eiseneger is a sophomore studying psychology. Her short story “Rewriting History (Without Words)” explores a scary and exciting day in the life of a student intern, deep in the future.
Click HERE to read Anna’s story.
The Madison Files Podcast (created by Peyton Berman and Ben Isom) explores the 2007 Kelly Nolan case through a blend of retelling and reinvestigation, tracing the known facts while also examining the speculation that has grown around an unsolved story. The podcast combines research, emotion, and critical reflection to ask not only what happened, but also why people feel such a strong desire to complete narratives even when certainty is impossible.
Click HERE to listen!
Anish Deshpande is a freshman majoring in Computer Science, Mathematics and Economics. His story “Beyond Words” explores what it truly means to conduct research and imagines an intriguing future for college students.
Click HERE to read Anish’s story.
Map It (created by Patricia Weiss, Addy Rule, and Madie Baumann) traces the Slender Man case from 2014 through the trials, sentencing, and later developments, while reflecting on how disturbingly close this story feels to home in Wisconsin. Created from the perspective of young women who grew up near the area, this podcast explores not only the sequence of events but also the emotional weight of friendship, fear, mental health, and the unsettling idea that a case like this can feel far less distant than we might imagine.
Click the image to the left to listen!