For my senior degree project I want to take the semester to design something that I feel will be relevant to people, society, good health and the world. By this I mean helpful in someway to those in need of help; and let us not pretend many are in need of help. However, help may take many forms: financial, educational, emotional, institutional, structural etc. There are many facets of life that are not well designed and it is my firm belief that I am not a designer in the traditional sense, but it is my duty to be a design thinker as a means of aiding those who cannot aid themselves. My wish is to use whatever insight I may have, (be there any at all) to bring peace to the most people for as much of the time as possible.
I do not want to do anything supposedly “green” fore green is a stamp of approval to mask short sightedness. I do not want to think sustainably fore sustainability is a bandaid on a broken bone. I do not want to keep it simple because simplicity will never take down the complexity of problems. I do not want to do anything interactive for interactivity’s sake. I do not want to make a website for a website’s sake. I do not want to make a video clip for a video clip’s sake. I do not want to make a poster for a poster’s sake. I do not want to letter press for letter pressing’s sake. I do not want to typographize for typography’s sake. I don’t want to design for design’s sake. Furthermore, and quite possibly most of all, I do not want to waste time proving in some banal and repetitive manner that whatever I have decided to do is worth pursuing. Nor do I want to ideate when clearly an idea has been hit upon that is worth my efforts.
Design is not solely about giving form to content. Design thinking is, and should be about making something more efficient, easier to use, simpler, cheaper etc. Design thinking should create new tools to improve quality of life or, more difficultly, improve existing tools for future use. Tool is used loosely here to describe anything human beings use to complete a necessary task. I add the caveat of necessity because I feel we must streamline the necessary tasks in order to enjoy the tasks of leisure. Design thinking must not always but in many cases include the people that the thinking is being done for. The reason for this is two fold: (1) they will learn, in some small way, design thinking (2) they will appreciate and understand more fully the tool that has been created for them. Understanding and appreciation are key to success fore without one or the other the tool would likely go not utilized, and therefore be an exercise in frivolity and futility.
As a concentration, of the afore mentioned facets of life that require the “help of design thinking”, education is one I am strongly drawn to. My reason for this is based on an idea I had some time ago: If you educate people, everything else will follow. It seems to follow reason that if more people were educated more of the time, then only good things could happen as a result. Economic, social, emotional, institutional, structural, financial problems would, at least in large part would be solved. I recognize that changing the world is outside the scope of this project; however, I do believe that I can come up with something that will be another step in the right direction. And if done properly it should be something that can grow and easily adapt to new situations as necessary.
1 comment:
ian, you have outlined with excellence "the mode" in which you like to work. you have talked about an approach to thinking, problem-solving, and process that you will employ -- my project process should function in this way, and in this way and in this way. that's very good because you are forming a strong design methodology that can be applied to any problem.
as i read, i got a touch worried because you were being really open-ended about what this methodology could be used for. but then you began the discussion of education, which was a relief.
the main way i will encourage you to approach this issue is to ponder what your "design issue" might be. by that i mean your project *could* be an exploration of how graphic design form, process, etc could be applied to a "class" of problems (education in this case, or a specific type of education, to slice it thinner). then the subject matter could switch out and you can see how "graphic design" helps to address a range of subject matters. the best example of late is garrett's project because his design issue is interaction, and he applied it to a range of subject matters.
your issue could be "how design facilitates user input" or "facilitating decision making" or who knows what. that's for you to investigate within the context of education.
you will need to focus on a particular subject or age range, and i would suggest an emerging trend so you have some social relevance. adbusters is all about killing neo-classical economics at the college level now, and has devoted several issues to discussing it. garrett's was loosely involved in the "no child left behind act". you might look into hot topics or areas of deficiency for u.s. kids -- perhaps math or science. but truthfully anything you do would be awesome. i just want you to use the subject matter to establish cultural relevance.
can't wait to see what evolves. great thoughts!
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