Abstract
This paper illustrates a collaborative design education model to show how design educators can contribute to solving existing societal challenges using their creativity, design thinking, and curriculum design. The author worked with the Service-members Agricultural Vocational Education (SAVE) organization to resolve two major challenges the United States faces today: prevent wounded soldiers’ suicides and help bridge the massive farmers shortage. Farming assists veterans with Post- Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in reducing their stress-levels and suicide attempts. The author utilized Service-learning pedagogy, Evidence Based Design, and User Centered Design and encouraged her graduate design students to employ their design thinking skills to develop an agricultural campus where soldiers could learn farming and focus on living a productive life. This project was presented at the finance committee of the US Senate in 2016 to demonstrate how designers can assist the agricultural community in boosting the economy while saving veterans’ lives. This paper discusses the author and her students’ research, Evidence Based Design (EBD) process, and share final design examples to demonstrate how designers can become “change agents” in the society, and solve societal challenges, how other educators can design learning experiences to develop an understanding of co-design, working with diverse clients and users, and importance of health, safety and public welfare within their students, clarify the role of the designer within society, how other economic sectors can benefit from design thinking approach to resolve the national or global market challenges, and why design should be considered valuable.
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Wounded Veterans, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Farming Therapy, Agricultural Community, Design Education, Agricultural Education, Collaboration, Service-Learning, Multi-disciplinary Education, Design Thinking, Evidence Based Design, Co-design, User Centered Design, Policy Change
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