Design Education Strategy

XR and AI as disruptors in South African art and design education

AuthorInstitution
de Klerk, AnnekeVaal University of Technology
Havenga, SarelVaal University of Technology
van Eck, RenéVaal University of Technology

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Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
XR and AI as disruptors in South African art and design education.pdf

This paper investigates the disruptive power of extended reality (XR) technologies, synergistically combined with artificial intelligence (AI), on creative art and design education in South Africa. Informed by an integrative literature review and insights derived from research conducted for the EU-funded Metaverse Academy Project with students and industry representatives, this study demonstrates how these technologies are altering established paradigms within artistic practice and design methodologies.

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Transforming design education through an innovative human-centred design approach to game-based learning

Author
Zulu, Nozipho Philasande

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Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Transforming design education through an innovative human-centred design approach to game-based learning.pdf

Global society demands continuous modification and enhancements to traditional teaching and learning to prepare students for the complex 21st century world. Higher education (HE) instructors in South African institutions are faced with unique challenges as the student populace is often culturally, socially, and linguistically diverse and also comes from varying socioeconomic backgrounds. To ensure student success, HE instructors should employ innovative human-centred design (Human-Vogel and Du Plessis 2024) strategies to respond to diverse student needs, improve performance and knowledge retention, and to increase motivation levels.

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Rethinking design education in India: A contextual approach

Author
Joshi, Priyanka Sewhag
Katiyar, Vijai Singh

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Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Rethinking design education in India.pdf

Over the years, the standard Indian school curriculum has increasingly marginalised arts, crafts, and design education. This has led to the neglect of interdisciplinary approaches and creative problem-solving skills, which are essential not only in professional fields but also in everyday life. The influence of Western science and technology on design education, along with the shift from local to global perspectives, has also impacted the preservation of indigenous handcrafts, cultural diversity, traditional knowledge systems, identities, and natural resources in craft-rich communities.

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Resonant realms: Bridging tradition and transformation in Afrikan-centred design

AuthorInstitution
Maharajh, ReshmaUniversity of Johannesburg

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Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Resonant realms.pdf

While global platforms provide wider recognition for ‘Afrikan’ design, they present challenges such as cultural appropriation and the erosion of indigenous knowledge (Oguibe, 2002). Through an Afrikan-centred and critical design approach, there is the potential to challenge the dominant narrative and foster cultural resilience by grounding creative practices in Rasa principles. Rasa theory is an aesthetic framework derived from classical Indian philosophy (Pandit 2024). This paper addresses the challenge of preserving ‘Afrikan’ cultural identity and fostering societal engagement through design.

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Many worlds, shared futures: Creative-science-community collaboration

AuthorInstitution
Cook, Shashi CullinanNelson Mandela University

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Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Many worlds, shared futures.pdf

In this paper I discuss opportunities for creative collaboration in sustainability science, more specifically Social-Ecological Systems (SES) – in which social and ecological concerns are treated as having the same weight. These transdisciplinary fields involve ‘non-scientists’ in solution-oriented approaches to sustainability challenges. The purpose of this paper is to highlight for design educators the potential of building stronger networks and partnerships in sustainability science contexts. The deep and attentive focus on nature, systems and communities in sustainability science offers a well of inspiration and purpose for creative practitioners, who in turn offer novel pathways for scientists and communities to imagine and share their work and knowledges.

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Investigating the role of embedded tactile and sensory technology as a digital disruption in technology-integrated design education

AuthorInstitution
van Zyl, IzakCape Peninsula University of Technology
Havenga, SarelCape Peninsula University of Technology
Snaddon, BruceCape Peninsula University of Technology

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Investigating the role of embedded tactile and sensory technology as a digital disruption in technology-integrated design education.pdf

This study investigates the integration of Embedded Tactile and Sensory Technologies as digital disruptions in South African design education, exploring how additive manufacturing and tactile interfaces can bridge theory with experiential learning. Grounded in Experiential Learning Theory (ELT), a Design-Based Research (DBR) methodology was employed to develop and test an educational intervention at a South African University of Technology. The research examined how the embedded technologies enhance student engagement, inclusivity, and creative problem-solving within a context of limited resources.

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Humanising online creative education: Exploring student engagement in a short course in copywriting

AuthorInstitution
Speechly, MandyIndependent Institute of Education

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Humanising online creative education.pdf

Online synchronous learning presents unique challenges when teaching creative fields such as design and copywriting. Creative education characteristically involves individual expression, informal group collaboration, and praxis-driven experiential learning. However, the online environment dehumanises the experience, reducing opportunities for essential social interaction and community development, which impacts on engagement and the learning experience. This paper aims to build on previous research in the humanising of online education, by examining strategies for enhancing social presence in the classroom, specifically in fields of creative education.

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History and policy in design education: The proposed development of an interdisciplinary Master of Design History in South Africa

AuthorInstitution
Haines, Richard JohnNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
History and policy in design education.pdf

This paper examines the relative paucity of curriculum offerings in design history and design education programmes at undergraduate and postgraduate levels in South Africa. The neglect of design history suggests a wholesale under-appreciation of the role of history and design development in industrial and economic production within the country in recent decades, as well as a disconnect between the relevant policy makers and the tertiary institutions in the country. The inexplicable lack of realisation of and response by business, state and society to the closure of the National Design Institute of South Africa in the early 2020s is an example of this disjunction.

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Future Earth: An approach for planet-centred interdisciplinary-design collaboration through STEAM(D) and biodesign for environmental sustainability in tertiary arts, design and engineering education in South Africa

AuthorInstitution
Smith, KyleIndependent Institute of Education

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Future Earth.pdf

South Africa’s escalating environmental challenges, exacerbated by the Anthropocene, demand a radical rethinking of design education. While science and engineering have developed mechanisms to address ecological degradation, design education remains rooted in Human-Centred Design, which prioritises human needs while neglecting planetary systems. This paper argues for a paradigm shift toward Planet-Centred Design, supported by interdisciplinary collaboration through STEAM(D) (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics + Design) and biodesign as transformative approaches for South African tertiary arts, design, and engineering education.

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Exploring how designing in their own language empowers students and supports academic freedom in communication design

AuthorInstitution
Graff, ChristiaanIndependent Institute of Education

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Exploring how designing in their own language empowers students and supports academic freedom in communication design.pdf

Language plays a crucial role in a person's daily life, from communicating with friends, family, and peers to shaping how individuals think and critically engage with the world around them. As the world becomes increasingly interconnected, English has emerged as the dominant and widely accepted language for communication. This trend is also evident in student award competitions, such as the Loeries, where the vast majority of finalists and winning entries are in English, with very few submissions in native languages. This observation suggests that tertiary institutions offering design degrees may not actively encourage students to complete their projects in their mother tongues.

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Earth stewardship in prepress: A model for graphic design educators

AuthorInstitution
Lottering, Barry JohnDurban University of Technology

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Graphic Design & Visual Art
Earth stewardship in prepress.pdf

This paper deals with the gap in undergraduate graphic design student prepress knowledge, and how addressing the shortfalls can lead to reduced waste through graduating designers that practice more informed reproduction. This paper follows the research for my master’s thesis (Lottering 2017) which emerged as a result of being required to teach prepress theory and finding that the amount of theory needed to be covered in the classroom was far too much and far too complex for students to fully understand given the available time allotted to teaching and learning on the topic. On an exchange trip to Sweden in 2014, my students were given the opportunity to print milk carton packs on an actual, industry standard flexographic press.

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Designing cultural competence: What South African instructional design can learn from nurses' assessments

AuthorInstitution
Gunkel, CarmenIndependent Institute of Education

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Designing cultural competence.pdf

The South African higher education landscape has become progressively diverse since the onset of democracy, with students emanating from different racial, cultural, religious, and socioeconomic backgrounds. As such, the country’s multicultural context highlights the need to focus on pedagogical approaches that promote inclusivity when designing learning experiences for diverse student needs and backgrounds. Cross-cultural interactions exist between educators, students, and instructional designers. Given that both implicit and explicit awareness is said to impact learning, it can be assumed that developing cultural competence affects the way learning is designed and experienced.

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Design play: Enhancing ideation skills through playful strategies in design education

AuthorInstitution
Padaruth, RakshaIndependent Institute of Education

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Design play.pdf

The ideation process is one of the most challenging components of the design process for students in Higher Education. Many students struggle with a lack of inspiration and confidence due to the need for perfection, which demotivates them to share or develop their ideas fully. Traditional ideation techniques often feel repetitive or restrictive, resulting in frustration and disengagement.

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Design audit Botswana — Part I: The drivers and barriers to establishing a government-led design innovation policy for industrial development in the Republic of Botswana

AuthorInstitution
Mothibedi, GabrielUniversity of Botswana

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Design audit Botswana.pdf

Government-led policies operate within distinct ‘National Contexts’, with implications from other policies. These contexts are critical for structuring innovation policies for design support. They preserve distinctive qualities such as cultural heritage and ingenious knowledge systems, and they work within socio-economic levels of maturity, autonomy, governance, market conditions, and appropriate infrastructure for design. In addition, effective innovation policy for design requires coordinated engagement of diverse stakeholders—spanning government, industry, academia, and design communities, constituting an integrated ecosystem referred to as a ‘National Design System’.

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Anticipatory design futures: Operationalising design fiction to strategically account for preferable futures

AuthorInstitution
Fenn, TerenceUniversity of Johannesburg

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Anticipatory design futures.pdf

The integration of 4IR technologies into the human world provides an opportunity for meaningful social transformation to occur. Paradoxically, 4IR technologies also pose potentially harmful threats to society. Hence, there has never been a more important time to ensure that considerations of their deployment into the social world are based on ethical principles. However, engaging with the internal dynamics of 4IR technologies and their dispersed, systemic nature requires specific technical knowledge that typically falls outside the remit of human-centred design. It is in light of this ethical concern coupled with new demands of that this paper will explore a new direction for Design and design education as ‘more-than-human-centred design’ practices.

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AI in education: Using Gardner’s five minds for the future to understand the effects of AI in design education

AuthorInstitution
Modiba, TholoIndependent Institute of Education

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
AI in education.pdf

In 2006, author Howard Gardner published a book titled Five Minds for the Future. The book considers how global trends in contemporary society, such as the increasing power of and reliance on technology, will affect the future of education and the development of human intelligence. The book goes on to outline a theoretical model of five different types of intelligences and the pertinent role each will play in the future. While the book was written and published nearly two decades ago, many of Gardner’s trends, forecasts, and analyses have proven useful over the progression of time, and continue to increase in global influence.

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A human-centred and collaborative approach to curriculum design for higher certificate programmes in creative disciplines – case study

AuthorInstitution
Caplin, SunetteIndependent Institute of Education

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
A human-centred and collaborative approach to curriculum design for higher certificate programmes in creative disciplines.pdf

Higher Certificate programmes serve as a bridge for students who do not meet the entry requirements for degree programmes, providing an opportunity to acquire the essential skills they may be lacking to complete or gain access to undergraduate studies of their choice. For these programmes to be effective, curriculum design must fully consider the Higher Certificate students as individuals with specific and unique learning needs, who often enter with varying levels of academic preparedness. Curriculum designers often assume that students already possess certain skills, including digital competencies and soft skills such as planning and time management. However, a lack of these skills might contribute to poor academic performance.

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Using SLOC as a co-design inquiry tool into nomadic pedagogy for a Design+Ecology project

AuthorInstitution
Assibey, Ginn BonsuCape Peninsula University of Technology
Chisin, Alettia VorsterCape Peninsula University of Technology
Snaddon, BruceCape Peninsula University of Technology

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Assibey - Using SLOC as a co-design inquiry tool into nomadic pedagogy.pdf

Design educators have been trying for the past decades to frame real-world problems in the context of studio-based practices through the lens of economic design logic as the status quo. Such studio-based design pedagogy distances students from real-world problems, leading to poor problem definition resulting from poor understanding and not experiencing the problem firsthand. In order to counter such a conservative design problem-solving approach some design educators have adopted nomadic pedagogy, which promotes curious-emphatic design approach that embraces performative enactment to generate solutions based on a well-defined problem.

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Creative correspondence: Leveraging design artefacts to generate shared plausible futures

AuthorInstitution
Fenn, TerenceUniversity of Johannesburg

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Fenn - Creative correspondence Leveraging design artefacts.pdf

Design anthropologists Gatt and Ingold's concept of correspondence describes a designed artefact's ability to appropriately represent a given community's perspectives. For design-researchers operating in co-design contexts, correspondence is helpful for ensuring that final outcomes are 'tuned' to the current and aspirational experiences of user-communities.

However, while design-researchers working in practice-led contexts share many concepts and techniques with their design anthropology colleagues, this paper argues that for Design approaches concerned with plausible, anticipatory perspectives, correspondence is a limited concept that can hamper the role of design imagination. In response to this claim, this paper contributes the following outcomes.

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