The following are the final FH3 papers. Unfortunately video taken at the conference was
corrupted and unsalvageable.
Design Research
Understanding Design: Cultivating Undergraduate Design Research
Sean Bolan, University of Washington
This paper seeks to examine the pedagogical implications of introducing design research into undergraduate design curriculum. It will look at a recent collaborative book project written and designed by the junior students in the multidisciplinary Design Studies program at the University of Washington. This book, titled “Understanding Design” was designed to help students develop basic research methods while concurrently providing an introductory overview of the discipline. It is divided into fourteen case studies strategically chosen to explore the landscape of design and attempts to represent a wide range of current design problems. Students were paired up with local professionals and worked collaboratively to analyze local projects, ultimately writing/designing a chapter in the book. This paper will closely examine the educational benefits of the project; the process students engaged in during the quarter and describe the specific learning outcomes.
Sean Bolan is a visual communication consultant, design researcher and educator. He has practiced professionally for over 15 years with major design studios in Holland, England, Spain, and the United States. Sean has lectured internationally and his work has been published in national and international publications. He received his Master’s degree in Visual Communication Design and his Master’s degree in Educational Psychology from the University of Washington. Sean also attended the Basel School of Design in Switzerland where his research focused on semiotics and typography. He previously served as the head of the graphic design program at Cornish College of the Arts and now teaches in the Visual Communication Design program and the Design Studies program at the University of Washington. Concurrently he is pursuing a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology and serves on the board of AIGA Seattle as the Co-Director of Education.
Social Responsibility in the Visual Communications Curriculum
Heidi Cies, Syracuse University
Historically, designers have been provocateurs of social and political messaging intended to inspire, incite, and motivate the public. Whether defined as civic engagement, sustainable choices or ethical actions, social responsibility is a part of the visual communicator’s dna, and its significance as ingrained in us as are the fundamentals of graphic design. We, as designers and design educators, are fortunate to be connected to such a long lineage of progenitors who have lent their talents towards design for the common good, and who advocate that the role of a designer includes some form of civic connectedness. This research study was designed to uncover and report on the methods and means educators are currently utilizing to introduce their students to the legacy of our respected role.
For the past 15 years Heidi Cies has been the principal of a Denver-based design studio with a mission to deliver strategic and sustainable visual communications solutions for companies, not-for-profit organizations and government agencies. Heidi recently received her Masters of Arts degree from Syracuse University. As a partner project to her written thesis, The Inclusion of Social Responsibility in the Visual Communications Curriculum, Heidi developed www.creativeforacause.org, a resource website for visual communications educators wishing to implement the concepts of civic engagement, ethical actions and sustainable choices in their coursework. Her philosophy includes perpetuating the value of design beyond the realm of consumerism.
Organizing for Innovation: New Challenges for Designers
Kelly Costello, Institute of Design at IIT
As companies face the challenge of thinking more innovatively — whether it is in how they go to market, whom they serve, or what they provide to their customers — they struggle to identify where, how, and which resources they should leverage and in what order. They may have already exhausted internal resources; thus for key decision makers the idea of connecting with a company or individuals known for innovation appears an excellent option for growing internal innovation capability. This puts designers
in the driver seat for the education and development of working professionals striving to become
more innovative.
As the leader of Doblin’s design research practice, Kelly keeps the firm’s battery of research methods current and effective. She works with a wide variety of clients in the development of new products, services, systems, and business opportunities.
Kelly holds a Masters of Design from the Institute of Design at IIT and a BFA in Visual Communication of
Anthropology from the University of Memphis. Kelly has led workshops and taught classes in visual communication, ethnographic research, documentary research methods and color narrative.
Learning from Victor Papanek
Stephanie Cunningham, Florida Atlantic University
Thirty-eight years ago in his book Design for the Real World, Victor Papanek advocated design
for human good, warned future generations of the dangers of trivial design, and alerted designers to
the risks of over-specialization. Decades later Design for the Real World continues to offer important
lessons for the contemporary practice as we grapple with finding the conscience of design and
dealing with the dilemmas presented by a fragmenting profession. As educators struggle with
limited time with students and technology’s increasing demands, Papanek’s words offer a practical
approach to both practice and pedagogy.
Stephanie Cunningham is an Associate Professor of Graphic Design at the Ft Lauderdale campus of
Florida Atlantic University. She received a BFA in Industrial Design from the Kansas City Art
Institute and an MFA in Design from the University of Notre Dame. Stephanie served as Copresident
for the AIGA Miami chapter from 2004-2006. In 2005, she served as the Duane Hanson
Allied Artist for the Public Art Master Plan for the Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood International Airport.
Stephanie's work has been exhibited widely and recognized by a number of awards and acquisitions.
Her work has appeared in select publications including, Big Book of Logos, Prix Ars Electronica, The
Computer in the Visual Arts, and Eye: The International Review of Graphic Design.
Making the Social, Technological, Environmental, Economic and Political Case for a Master’s Level
Educational Experience Titled, Collaborative Innovation Studies
Michael R. Gibson, University of North Texas
The communication design faculty at unt have a ten-year history of forging and sustaining collaborative, interdisciplinary applied research and other scholarly relationships with unt faculty and graduate students in the social sciences (particularly Anthropology and Rehabilitation, Social Work and Addictions), Information Technology and Decision Sciences, Marketing and Logistics, Journalism, Merchandising and Information Science. This presentation will reveal how what we’ve learned during these experiences has affected the manner in which we have begun to facilitate and teach graduate level research involving design. It will also explicate how we have used this knowledge to design a new, trans-disciplinary graduate program that will afford students from several disciplines (including design) a variety of opportunities to use designing as a means to positively transform select social, technological, environmental, economic and political initiatives.
Michael R. Gibson teaches communication design studio courses, as well as design research, criticism, history, theory and interactive media at the University of North Texas College of Visual Arts and Design (unt cvad). Over the last 16 years, he has spoken at a variety of conferences within and outside the discipline, and his publications and professional projects reflect his interest in formulating and implementing processes that transcend boundaries. He has managed a strategic design consultancy since 1987, which has afforded him several opportunities to attempt to bridge the divide between the practical demands of professional practice and the need to account for how the results of designing affect and are affected by a broad spectrum of social, technological and political issues. His original and applied research projects have addressed issues in education, children’s and women’s health, media ethics and developing usable and useful user experiences in dynamic media applications.
Towards an Applied Iconic Research
Michael Renner, The Basel School of Design
Many research projects, which are labeled design research, do not clearly state the contribution of
the designer in the interdisciplinary team. Under these circumstances, design research is often implemented by adapting to an established methodology of an already existing research discipline.
If we want to do research in a particular field of practice, then we have to ask ourselves what knowledge already exists in this field and use that as a starting point. For a designer the starting point, or his/her established competence, is the creation of images. From this starting point a designer can do research into the methods of the creation of images. This research could generate knowledge to be used in the design field. And going a step further, the creation of images could develop into a methodology, which could then be used to gain knowledge about images. This can be described in short as research about images through images, or Iconic Research.
Professor Michael Renner worked for Apple Computer Inc. and The Understanding Business in California in 1986, just after completing his Graphic Design diploma at the Basel School of Design. Since 1990, he has run his own design studio with corporate and cultural clients. He started teaching in 1990 in the Visual Communication department at the hgk in Basel with an emphasis on Information Design, Interaction Design and Design oriented Research. In 1999 he was named chairman of the department. Since 2005 he is a member of «eikones», the Swiss National Center of Competence in Iconic Criticism. He has lectured and taught workshops on the theme of Visual Communication, Interactive Media and Inquiry by Design in Europe and abroad.
Effectively Assessing the Learning Outcomes of Students:
The Use of Pre- and Post-Testing Methods
Stacie Rohrbach, Carnegie Mellon University
Many design educators implement teaching practices that they learned by shadowing mentors,similar to an apprenticeship. However, based on the continual evolution of design students, professional practice, and institutional accountability design educators must establish sound approaches to pedagogy that will improve current teaching practices and inform those that develop in the future. In taking steps to achieve this goal, this paper describes the pre- and post-testing methods and assessment tools that were used to evaluate the learning achievements of students who participated in an online visual design tutorial. Through the presentation of the study, this paper argues the importance for design educators to assess systematically the pre-existing and post-course knowledge and skills
of students to measure the effectiveness of their teaching practices. An analysis of this study reveals ways for similar assessment methods to be applied to various types of design courses and describes their potential impact on whole curriculums.
Stacie Rohrbach is an Assistant Professor at the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University,
where she teaches studio- and seminar-based communication design courses at all levels of the undergraduate and graduate curriculum. Rohrbach’s research investigates how combining design processes and learning theories improves the teaching of complex and abstract content — specifically visual communication. She is exploring the design of educational tools and methods for university students within and outside of design, in classroom and online contexts. The nature of her work
allows her to explore the relationships that exist between print and digital media and the combined communicative value of sound, motion, and visuals as educational tools. Rohrbach has worked professionally in both print and digital media as a designer, art director, researcher, and adjunct lecturer. Rohrbach earned a BFA in Graphic Design from Carnegie Mellon University and a Master of Graphic Design degree from North Carolina State University.
Undergraduate Curriculum
Autonomy at the End of the Beginning
Leslie Becker, Ph.D., California College of the Arts
What is the best way to conclude an undergraduate education in graphic design? Though seemingly counterintuitive, we expose our already concept-and-form-infatuated students to the ultimate in unrealistic design freedom by asking them to formulate their own questions and develop their own answers. Rather than “test” their cumulative design knowledge and skills in a tidily pre-calibrated demonstration, we favor the specific goal of developing autonomy (internal) within a high degree of design freedom (external). Requiring our students to determine the question, content, and form of communication, they confront hiding behind research, integrating research with skills, overcoming boredom, and self-imposing limits. As shown, the results of the work are often startling and unpredictable. Hopefully, this evolved autonomy serves to develop a rigor about what we have termed a personal point of view as the student concludes undergraduate studies and begins their next iteration in design — either in graduate studies or at work.
Dr. Leslie Becker is currently Director of Design and former chair of the graphic design program at California College of the Arts. She teaches a wide range of courses including graphic design studios, Visual Studies and Visual Criticism that address the ethical and social effects of design upon popular culture. A practicing designer for thirty years, Leslie has done a wide range of work in areas such as corporate graphics, signage systems, interiors and furniture. She has presented at aiga and aicad conferences, Tsinghua University Beijing, Harvard University, St. Louis University Business School, University College Dublin, and London College of Communications. Her writing has appeared in Print, sfdc Magazine, Graphis New Talent, Design Book Review, and texts edited by Steven Heller. She holds a BFA from The Cooper Union, an MA in Design from U.C. Berkeley, and a Ph.D. from U.C. Berkeley in Architecture/Theory and Methods.
Technology Integration & Blog Culture at the Kansas City Art Institute
Michael Eppelheimer and Jamie Gray, Kansas City Art Institute
All KCAI design students maintain continuous process blogs. This expandable format becomes an open archive of their body of work and a casual record of influences and research. Realtime process documentation reveals synthesis across studios between subject matter and design principles. Studio communication is delivered via instructor blogs, resulting in a paperless, expedient and responsive studio culture. Blogs are used to catalog requirements, resources and deadlines, as well as spark inspiration and conversation. The blog community at KCAI creates additional and unique opportunities for student-to-faculty and student-to-student dialogue. A deliberate and simultaneous approach to print and screen based media, at every semester, prepares students to be flexible and adaptable design thinkers that can tackle complex design problems and anticipate the demands of the design profession. Introducing multimedia within introductory projects readies students for the upper-level course sequence that covers in-depth grounding in theory and skills, such as narrative, social media and
non-linear interactivity.
Jamie Gray is Assistant Professor in the graphic design department at KCAI. She completed her Master’s degree in graphic design from North Carolina State University where she received the Raleigh Hunter Fellowship in Visual Design and the department Book Award. Her graduate work focused upon speculative design possibilities for “digital collecting” behaviors, which she most recently presented at the 2008 AIGA Massaging Media 2 conference in Boston. Jamie also holds a bachelor’s degree in design from Arizona State University in Tempe.
Michael Eppelheimer is Assistant Professor in the graphic design department at KCAI. He has 17 years of professional experience in both print and screen-based media with a wide array of clients and studios in America and Switzerland in such areas as corporate identity, branding, and interface design. Michael obtained his BFA in graphic design from the University of Illinois at Chicago and attended advanced studies at the Basel School of Design.
Herron School of Art and Design: Learning to Design for 21st Century Complexity
Lee Vander Kooi, Indiana University Herron School
Our culture is shifting in response to the emergence of new values for forging a sustainable relationship with the planet. Our business enterprises are shifting in response to the emergence of new values
for integrating truly people-centered perspectives into product and service developments. Our design practices are shifting in response to the emergence of new values for working collaboratively in
cross-functional, cross-disciplinary teams to find problems and develop meaningful, innovative solutions. Responding to the realities of a continuously reconfiguring world, faculty members at Herron determined that traditional studio approaches to design education, that prioritize the development of
the designer as an idiosyncratic individual, might limit students’ abilities to be successful in 21st
century professions.
Assistant Professor Vander Kooi was appointed to the Visual Communication Design faculty at the Herron School of Art and Design in 2006. Previously, he was a Visiting Assistant Professor at University of Hawaii. At Herron, Vander Kooi teaches undergraduate courses and studio courses in the graduate program. His areas of research interest include exploring form making as related to enhancing collaborative process skills, using technology to facilitate student reflection, and the assessment of design competencies. His design experience includes print collateral and identity work, working on multi-disciplinary teams, and web design and development. He has worked collaboratively for leading companies including ge, National City Bank, and Smuckers. Vander Kooi graduated from the University of Akron with a BFA in Graphic Design and a Master of Design from North Carolina State
University, Raleigh.
Graphic Design, Beginning I: A New Approach
John Luttropp and Anthony Inciong, Montclair State University
Due to increasing demand for our first level graphic design course, and with the introduction of a new bfa in Graphic Design, we had to rethink the way we teach Graphic Design: Beginning I. We offered several sections of the course with different instructors. Keeping consistency from one section to another was a problem, as was getting the sections to work together. We realized that it would make sense to separate the lecture and studios, as is often done in the lab sciences. Now, all sections of the class meet together for a two-hour session in a lecture hall one day and meet in smaller groups for separate, four-hour studio sessions on another day. We developed a curriculum that injects more theory and discussion into the course and a sequence of projects that provide a strong foundation of graphic design principles and skills. We will discuss the planning, implementation, successes, and problems we faced in making this change.
John Luttropp is a Full Professor and Director of the Graphic Design program at Montclair State University in New Jersey. He is a former Department Chair and has had extensive experience in program development. He received his mfa in Advertising Design from Syracuse University and
his BFA in Sculpture from Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design. In addition to teaching and working professionally as a graphic designer and fine artist, Professor Luttropp has co-authored three
textbooks on graphic design.
Anthony Inciong is an Assistant Professor of Graphic Design at Montclair State University. His teaching and research emphasize typography, history, theory, and criticism in print and time-based media. His writings have been published by the Association Typographique Internationale, Open Manifesto, AIGA, and Emigre magazine. He has worked for The Late Show with David Letterman, Siegel+Gale, Eric Baker Design Associates, Design/Writing/Research, and Graphis. Professor Inciong holds a
Master of Graphic Design from North Carolina State University and a BFA in Graphic Design from Rutgers University, Newark, NJ.
Intersecting Static and Dynamic Methodology
Ben Meyer and Renee Seward, University of Cincinnati
Graduates from the University of Cincinnati, Digital Design program pursue careers in interface design, motion graphics, human factors, and information design. Our challenge was to develop a curriculum that introduces the principles of animation and time based software while building on the student’s basic knowledge of typography, form and visual design systems. Before this curriculum was developed, students were unable to effectively tie the principles of animation with their knowledge of typography, form, and design systems. We have sought to evolve our curriculum to meet these missing needs through the development of a duo studio project that involves visualizing spoken word in print and
in animation.
Ben Meyer is currently an Assistant Professor in the Digital Design program at the University of Cincinnati’s College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning. Prior to his appointment at Cincinnati, he has worked as a CG artist and animator for clients such as Hasbro, Warner Brothers, and South Peak Interactive. Ben has also developed interactive training material for corporate clients such as Motorola and for government programs such as the United States and British military.
Renee Seward is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Digital Design program at the University of Cincinnati’s College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning. Prior to her appointment, Renee graduated from North Carolina State University and received the 2006–2007 World Studio Scholarship Award from the World Studio Foundation in New York. Renee is currently working with educators at
the Achievement School in Raleigh, developing interactive tools for children with dyslexia.
It is what it is; whaddaya gonna do
Angela Rodgers and Tuan Phan, St. Edward's University
as an educator teaching at an institution of higher learning
you are not a BFA program
you don’t have 72 credit hours of graphic design coursework
you don’t have 3+ hour studios
you don’t have 3+ full time faculty
you don’t have dedicated studio space or labs for your department or yourself
you don’t have a MFA program
you don’t do “research”
your course load isn’t a 1/1, 2/2 or even a 3/3
you are not “recognized” by AIGA, NASAD, or Meredith Davis
you are wondering why you are at this conference
maybe
you have visited your campus ethicist to determine the morality of calling your
program “Graphic Design”
seeing how you don’t want to crop or compress 72 hours of classes into 48, you
question the paradigm you bring from your own BFA/MFA experiences…
if you’re not worried about what you don’t have, then what are you teaching?
Tuan Phan graduated from the University of Houston with a degree in graphic communication.
He worked in Houston awhile before going for his MFA at Calarts. After grad school, he taught
for three years as a visiting designer at The University of Texas at Austin. He currently teaches
full-time at St. Edward’s University in Austin.
Angela Rodgers graduated from Texas A&M University with a degree in International Studies.
She earned her MFA in design at The University of Texas at Austin. She is a co-founder of MIRA
design lab. Currently, she teaches at St. Edward’s University and is the Area Coordinator of the
Graphic Design Program.
Design as System / Food as System
2008 Launch of First Junior-level Studio Within New Curricular Structure
N. Silas Munro and Martha Scotford, North Carolina State University
The junior-level graphic design studio is introduced like this: Design practices and artifacts are a system that exists within multiple other systems: culture, business, production, distribution, and consumption
(to name the larger ones). As a way to study and act within design systems, the studio group will look
at food systems (as it happens existing within the same systems) as analogous cases, and use sectors of food systems for the content of the design activities. Our presentation provides the institutional and curricular context for this studio, taught for the first time in fall 2008, describes the pedagogical goals
of the curricular structure, and explains the projects involved, showing examples of the student
work produced.
Martha Scotford, a designer, author and Professor of Graphic Design at North Carolina State University, has taught design history, typography and design studios since 1981. She holds a BA in Art History from Oberlin College and a MFA in Graphic Design from Yale University. Before teaching she was a book designer in Boston. Scotford is the author of articles on design, design education and type history published in journals and magazines including Design Issues, Visible Language, and EYE. She researched (supported by nea funding), wrote and designed the book Cipe Pineles: a Life of Design published by WW Norton & Company in 1999, and was a principal collaborator on the project For the Voice: Mayakovsky and Lissitzky published by Artists Bookworks and The British Library in 2000. She spent early 2001 in India as a Fulbright Lecturer teaching typography and Western design history.
N. Silas Munro is the Designer-in-Residence and Visiting Assistant Professor of Graphic Design at NC State’s College of Design. From the Desk of: is his design practice, whose clients and collaborators include: Catalone Design Co., Grafik, Green Dragon OYce, the Orange County Museum of Art, SSA & Company, Rock Your Resume and Take, an imaging studio. His work has been recognized by the AIGA, the ADC’s Young Guns, the AR100, ID, and Print. Munro is a past Design Fellow of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. He holds a MFA from California Institute of the Arts and a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design, both in Graphic Design. A word aficionado, his minor in poetry (RISD/Brown University) has spurred his voice to GOOD, Novum, Speak Up, and the Walker Art Center Design Blog. Munro has been a lecturer, teacher, and critic at Art Center, CalArts, MICA, NC State, Otis, and RISD.
MFA Thesis Projects
The Web 2.0 Revolution in Online Design Education:
How social networking technologies are enabling virtual design learning
Karen Kwan, York University, Toronto
The Master of Design (mdes) program at York University is a five-term program that investigates the social, cultural and technological dimensions of graphic design/visual communication. In preparing students for their thesis projects, the curriculum of the mdes program stresses the contextual nature of design, the importance of individual analysis, and studio practice as methodology. This presentation summarizes the research and process of my thesis on the pedagogy of university-level online design education with specific emphasis on the utilization of Web 2.0 social networking tools. By exploring learning theories and the philosophies of design education, this research proposes a framework for leveraging recent innovations in social networking technologies to facilitate these values in an
online environment.
Karen Kwan is a candidate for the Master of Design at York University in Toronto, Canada. Prior to entering the graduate program, she completed a Bachelor of Business Administration and a Bachelor
of Technology. Karen has several years of experience as a designer in the private sector and is currently part of the Multimedia department in one of Canada’s leading financial institutions. In the winter term Karen will be the Course Director of an online course offered by the department of Design
at York University.
Teaching Patients System Thinking and Management Skills
Valentina Miosuro, North Carolina State University
The intent of this thesis is to address the problem of patients’ lack of disease management and system thinking skills through a study of visual skill training and monitoring programs. The hope is to make sense of the research done in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus, disease management, non-adherence, educational psychology, system dynamics and organizational behavior. A further goal is to move the disheartened non-adherent patients to become disease managers, and to create instances for design to intervene and work with patients in a meaningful way.
The intent of this presentation is to share concepts and tools transferable to practice — teaching clients to think systematically about problems, analyzing user experience and setting up conditions for [ideal] user experience — as well as sharing how her work at Siegel+Gale is helping the IRS enhance compliance and optimize taxpayer experience.
Born and raised in Milan, Italy Valentina came to the U.S. as an exchange student in 2000. As an information architect at Siegel+Gale’s Simplification Group, Valentina creates user-centered solutions that satisfy customer expectations for utility and ease of use, while also supporting business requirements and brand strategy. She is involved in analyzing user needs and business objectives, including conducting interviews with stakeholders and users, developing content and workflow maps that indicate process and systems implications, navigation, and content relationships. Valentina received a bfa in Visual Communication Design from the University of Indiana’s Herron School of
Art + Design, followed by a Master’s in Graphic Design from North Carolina State University.
Wayfinding and Waygiving: Mapping Meaningful Relationships Between Design Artifacts,
Users, and Environment
Leilah Rampa, University of Illinois at Chicago
The most fascinating aspect of design concerns the nature of form where a composition of tensions defines a space, creating a place filled with meaning. By slightly changing the arrangement of things, new meaning forms. The challenge of information design lies in the act of aligning form to content, creating a meaningful place that clarifies information to the public. It is information design that embodies the materiality of Michael Foucault’s self-governance theory; that design is a powerful tool that can liberate people by clarifying a system, such as transit information, structuring the field of our possible action so we may act on our own. The visualization of this thesis research seeks to illustrate relationships between design artifacts in regard to wayfinding.
Rampa earned her BFA from Jacksonville State University in Jacksonville, Alabama, in 2003. After graduation, she accepted a position as editorial cartoonist, drawing daily political commentary for the Anniston Star, a small liberal newspaper located in Northeast Alabama. In 2006 she enrolled in the graduate program at the University of Illinois at Chicago and earned her MFA degree in 2008. She currently works as a designer for Morningstar Associates in Chicago.