Designing New Futures for Design Education

Abstract

Abstract The design community has made several calls to re-imagine a design education for the future. Here I share a series of visual representations of guiding principles for design curricula that respond to these calls. These sketches were created over several years, exploring visually different objectives for design curricula. In doing the drawings, I wrestle with my own urge to break away from the Ulm-inspired design education of my youth. I created these drawings, often inspired by other images, over several years, as I reflected on design curricula inspired by different contexts: the needs of people in the Global South and of the most “vulnerable” countries (as defined by the United Nations); the pedagogical strategies of Freirean-inspired critical and empowering design education; design education methodologies that mean to promote twenty-first-century skills; design education practices inspired by Latin American decolonial scholars; and, finally, the complexities of pan-African identity. The article acknowledges other examples of decolonial design curricula. While none of the sketches is a complete curriculum, each invites other educators to challenge existing design education paradigms and create culturally relevant curricula for learners in their contexts.