The Integration of Social Issues in Design Education as a Catalyst towards Social Sustainability (original) (raw)
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2014
This design case describes an ideation process designed to be held with some of the schools of the Municipality of Torres Novas, Portugal, where the students were invited to imagine their school in relation to a future scenario. The initial objective of the exercise was to explore ways in which design could foster ecological literacy through participatory processes. The difficulties found along the way, however, have led me to reflect on the role of the designer as activator, integrator, and facilitator of design creative process in this context, using design as a platform to co-creatively construct ecological imaginaries and possible ways toward sustainability.
Sustentabilidade em projectos de design
Convergências, 2022
Higher education institutions have a responsibility to contribute to a more sustainable development. However, this contribution hasn't always been consequential, especially when the focus is more on the construction of mere tools for sustainability, than on the process of internal transformation. That is, on the development of a true training for sustainability, consequently for a curriculum more oriented towards sustainability and with valid contributions for sustainable development, namely in the regions where they are based. On the other hand, ecodesign analysis tools, namely checklists, have been used successfully in companies, but also in education, and have made an important contribution to sustainability, fundamentally in the environmental and economic dimensions. Consolidated experiences in these areas have shown that employing these tools implies a contextualization of their use, in the case of their application in a teaching context, among students, or in a business environment, among professionals. It depends on the social, economic, and business context of the region or country, but, in the specific case of an application in education, it also depends on the type of subjects and the teaching and learning methods. In addition, the usefulness of the checklists is observed in various contexts of everyday life, but also in the professional environment and in teaching, as it is a tool that can help teachers and students to guide projects towards the final objectives, also valuing the process of getting there. The present study emerged from an investigation carried out within the scope of sus
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The article stems from the author's experience as a fashion designer and teacher and takes stock of the application of the principles of sustainable development in the field of Fashion, but does not fail to identify reasons and difficulties in the emergence of theories of sustainability. The work indicates the protagonists of the change and underlines the central role of education and training; it points out the particular affinity of the artistic and design disciplines with the reasons of the Ethics of Development, as they are structurally linked to human work both in the planning and in the realization phase. They are then indicated principles and methods of movements and phenomena, in which the world of sustainable fashion is articulated, particularly critical towards the "fast fashion", that is, that system that continuously realizes low quality and low price clothes, typical expression of the consumerist model that wastes natural and energy resources, produces pollution and waste, exploits the work, so it doesn't care neither of the ecological nor of the ethical aspects of production and marketing.
ECADE Official Conference Proceedings, 2022
This study aims to contextualise and describe a pedagogical practice developed in the Academic curriculum at Lusófona University of Porto (ULP) in the first semester of 2021/22 with students from the 2nd year of Communication Design bachelor. A pencil for a school is a solidarity campaign to help build a school in the village of Matsinho, in the province of Manica, Mozambique. This is a project carried out by The Big Hand, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) that promotes the well-being of children living under unfavourable environmental conditions, ensuring their access to education, healthcare and nutrition. The campaign’s briefing includes a pencil, a set of posters, a roll-up, a T-shirt, and a label for a can to collect donations. To complement the project developed in Design classes, a free one-day workshop was held, in which students had the opportunity to talk with the President of the NGO, ask questions and share ideas. This article emphasises the responsibility of educators in preparing young students and future designers to be able to face contemporary challenges, using their skills as an alternative method of intervention in social issues and realising the role of design in promoting positive change. It also offers a solid opportunity to prepare graduates for the real working world and encourage engagement through innovative practice. It also proved to inspire the new generation of designers to have an empathetic mentality and do not work only for commercial purposes but also for social needs.
The daily activities as designers contemplate open minded new tendencies, such as technology, fashion, art, a wide range of different areas that are part of the evolution of industry, and the attention that is given to them is huge. This kind of constantly refreshing information that fills e-mails with newsletters, blogs, portfolios platforms are the inspirational source for many designers and design students. The seeking eye is mostly focused on the tendencies of the great market on digital platforms. This paper presents a reflection of a collection of testimonials and enquiries of a pilot experience in Design Education where students collaborated with stakeholders and citizens, with different kinds of interventions seeking to contribute on economic, social, physical or environment effect. The impact of this experience revealed that there's a relevant detachment from reality, from the others and from the unknown. The participation in this kind of activities, where they go beyond the limits of their ordinary experience, is a step to personal development on civic responsibility, awareness and empathy in the mind of future designers and their future activities that can contribute or not to social progress.
The Design Journal
From the Design viewpoint, sustainable strategies must be integrated into a wide collaborative system that contemplates the environmental, socio-cultural, economic and technological dimensions as a whole. This paper presents a pilot experience in Design Education that discusses social innovation for sustainability in the city of Uberlandia/MG/Brazil. By involving a group of undergraduate design students of the Federal University and Second Hand Furniture Stores, the objectives of the trial were: (1) to find alternative solutions to social and environmental problems; (2) to connect theory and practice by generating a "home interiors prototype"; (3) to stimulate collaboration among the University, young designers and society and (4) to foster a virtuous cycle of actions. Despite the many positive aspects achieved, a continuous collective effort is crucial in order to include new partners, such as support institutions and local government as well as to gradually engage companies in trying new paths towards a more responsible behaviour.
NOTES ON THE EDUCATIONAL DIMENSION OF DESIGN FOR SOCIAL INNOVATION
Increasing research in design for social innovation has influenced how education in design may change to deal with social problems. The educational dimension of design, in its turn, is commonly referred to as the relationship between professor and design students. However, when designers work together with communities, they suggest new ways of acting and, consequently, inspire changes in people's behavior. In this sense, they also play an educational role. This article presents a vision of designers as educators, not only in the relationship between professors and students, but also in the relation between designers and community. In order to illustrate this, the theme of ageing population is used as an example of a social issue, suggesting approaches to deal with this subject during a design course and as a project with an elderly community. As a result, it demonstrates strategies to work with social issues along with students and communities: in the first case, as a way to reflect and redefine problems, in order to design creative solutions; secondly by explaining practical applications of the designers’ work and considering people’s prior experiences, as a way to facilitate a process of local change.
Proceedings of the 3rd International Symposium on Sustainable Design (III ISSD), 2011
DESIS (http://www.ltds.ufrj.br/desis/) is a network of schools of design and other schools, institutions, companies and non-profit organizations interested in promoting and supporting design for social innovation and sustainability. The Center for Systemic Approach to Design (NASDESIGN), inside the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC), Florianopolis, Brazil, is a research lab connected to this network, that applies DESIS tools inside its projects. Besides, the laboratory has developed its own dynamic to apply these tools, in order to integrate social innovation and sustainability research with extension education. Problems within communities are searched and become object to be studied by Bachelor and Master students of the Program in Design and Graphic Expression within the University. The idea is to involve students with sustainable issues since their under graduation, integrating, thus, DESIS tools within design education. This article reports the case of projects developed by NASDESIGN in 2010 when, in consequence, it was launched the I Seminar in Design, Social Innovation and Sustainability. Finally, it is explained how the course of Sustainability, inside the Design Program of the University, had the role of integrating design specialties (graphic, product and animation) and developing promising cases, which results in strengthening and social motivation through design.
A design studio experience: impacts of social sustainability
Archnet-IJAR: International Journal of Architectural Research, 2019
Purpose Sustainability, especially in terms of development and growth, has been in the agenda of the world community for several decades. However, apparently not all the aspects of sustainability are given equal importance. Ecologic and economic components of sustainability have been in the focal point of many theoretical and practical works, as the social aspect has been mostly left out of emphasis. The purpose of this paper is to examine the social aspects of sustainability and its relation to architecture, with respect to the strong connection between the society and the built environment. Design/methodology/approach The core of the paper consists of a case study conducted at a design studio course for third-year architecture students whereas the outcomes of the student works on the design problem are evaluated as examples for design approaches to reflect the effects of the built environment on social sustainability. The case study is supported with a literature review and examin...