TY - GEN
T1 - Systems thinking and connecting the silos of design education
AU - Park, Hyuna
AU - Benson, Eric
PY - 2013
Y1 - 2013
N2 - While the design industry is a complex and multidimensional landscape, the current design curriculum lives in stark contrast: linear and compartmentalized. University product design curricula are mainly insular, where studio art is separated from liberal arts courses, despite their close physical and theoretical proximities. While this separation allows students to effectively attain proficiency in skill-sets relevant to the product design discipline, students do not learn how liberal arts education can complement their design knowledge. These silos of practice stand in opposition to the type of creative processes and collaborations necessary to help solve the issues that humanity faces today. Wicked problems like climate change must be discussed in design education. The solutions to these problems mandate collaboration with other disciplines such as anthropology and/or engineering. This article is a proposal for new research examining how a liberal arts "integrated" design education may enhance the design students' systems thinking abilities. A more effective design curriculum will need to employ a systems thinking methodology, so a project can be viewed as a part of an entire system of connected concerns. This mode of thinking would not render the designer a generalist, but instead one that is always seeking to collaborate and explore outcomes outside of their typical artifacts. This article will also examine how the current product design education is structured and, despite the differences in the teaching and learning environment of liberal arts courses are different from studio art courses, they could and should work together effectively.
AB - While the design industry is a complex and multidimensional landscape, the current design curriculum lives in stark contrast: linear and compartmentalized. University product design curricula are mainly insular, where studio art is separated from liberal arts courses, despite their close physical and theoretical proximities. While this separation allows students to effectively attain proficiency in skill-sets relevant to the product design discipline, students do not learn how liberal arts education can complement their design knowledge. These silos of practice stand in opposition to the type of creative processes and collaborations necessary to help solve the issues that humanity faces today. Wicked problems like climate change must be discussed in design education. The solutions to these problems mandate collaboration with other disciplines such as anthropology and/or engineering. This article is a proposal for new research examining how a liberal arts "integrated" design education may enhance the design students' systems thinking abilities. A more effective design curriculum will need to employ a systems thinking methodology, so a project can be viewed as a part of an entire system of connected concerns. This mode of thinking would not render the designer a generalist, but instead one that is always seeking to collaborate and explore outcomes outside of their typical artifacts. This article will also examine how the current product design education is structured and, despite the differences in the teaching and learning environment of liberal arts courses are different from studio art courses, they could and should work together effectively.
KW - Integrated education system
KW - Interdisciplinary
KW - Liberal arts
KW - Systems thinking
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84891319952&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84891319952&partnerID=8YFLogxK
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:84891319952
SN - 9781904670421
T3 - Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Engineering and Product Design Education: Design Education - Growing Our Future, EPDE 2013
SP - 277
EP - 281
BT - Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Engineering and Product Design Education
T2 - 15th International Conference on Engineering and Product Design Education: Design Education - Growing Our Future, EPDE 2013
Y2 - 5 September 2013 through 6 September 2013
ER -