The Africa International Design Awards (AIDA) is a pioneering design advocacy platform that recognises and celebrates both African designers and international designers whose work is deeply rooted in Africa, creating innovative solutions to address the unique challenges faced by African communities.

From 18–19 September, DEFSA hosted its 18th Biennial Conference, DESIGN+: Disruptions, Realities, Futures. The conference was a rich exchange of transformative dialogue — bridging physical and digital, Afrikan and global perspectives.

Presented by DEFSA in partnership with the Department of Sports, Arts & Culture, the pilot edition of the What If! Design Competition concluded on 17 September with a virtual award ceremony.

This pioneering competition challenged students to reimagine a sustainable, human-centred future. The submissions were powerful, bold, and deeply rooted in African knowledge systems, while also pushing forward speculative futures.

For students in creative industries, talent alone isn’t enough to secure a job. Standing out in a competitive job market requires proof of skill, innovation and industry recognition - and that’s where and why creative award competitions play a vital role.

The 2025 DEFSA National Conference offers both in-person and virtual attendance options. Author registration includes page fees, and discounted rates are available for students. Click for fees, as well as accommodation and transport options.

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How can design disrupt conventional paradigms to reimagine a sustainable future that balances technological innovation, cultural stewardship, and empathetic, human-centred solutions to address the world’s pressing challenges?

The first stage of DEFSA's 18th national conference is complete and WOW - 126 abstracts were submitted!  We are thrilled to see how the conference theme resonated with so many. We received abstracts across the full range of design disciplines and institutions, including several international academic thought leaders. The papers will now move to the Abstract Review phase.

We’re excited to invite you and your colleagues to register for our online teacher training workshops, designed to support educators preparing students for the WHAT IF! Design: 2025 South Africa Design Competition. These workshops will equip you with practical tools, insights, and methods to effectively guide your students through the competition and beyond.

Workshop Overview:

Session 1 DEFSA Writing Workshop

This workshop session was geared towards young design academics who are compiling academic research papers, and is helpful to all educators finalising their papers for the DEFSA 2023 Conference in September 2023. It covered: • Structure of an academic paper • Building an argument • Academic paper writing do's and don'ts • Referencing • Checklist before submitting

Presenters: Dr Sue Giloi - Inscape Education Group (South Africa) Dr Yolandi Burger - Loughborough University (United Kingdom) Dr Ria van Zyl - Vega School (South Africa)

Taking a broad definition of design and drawing on the shared histories and legacies of settler colonialism in Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia and South Africa, The Politics of Design offers a wide-ranging comparative study that focuses specifically on the role of design in creating and perpetuating the privileges and prejudices of racial hierarchies.

Inscape, the first private higher education institution to be validated by the South African Council for the Architectural Profession (SACAP).

When students listen in lectures, often they are taking part in the discussion, thinking what they want to say, and often simply distracted by their environment for a few minutes. But I also don't want them so busy note-taking they don't engage with discussions.

Having pre-lecture handouts gives anxious learners an opportunity to prepare on the topic. Post-lecture handouts and assessments "fix" the information in memory. The secret to handouts, is to make it more than the bullet list from the slides or keywords they would have already noted down.

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The future learning ecosystem–a holistic, lifelong, personalized learning paradigm–represents a contrast to the Industrial Age model of time-focused, one-size-fits-all learning. It promises to substantively change the way we learn, moving away from old models of disconnected experiences to a connected continuum of lifelong learning, personalized, driven by data, and delivered across diverse locations, media, and periods of time.

DEFSA Member institutions - do you have an outstanding design student struggling to finance their post-graduate studies?

Mandela Rhodes scholarships are open to young Africans who have demonstrated that they embody the founding principles of reconciliation, education, entrepreneurship, and leadership. The funds will help students in covering up their tuition fees and living expenses.

The applicant must meet the following eligibility criteria to apply for the scholarship:

In her keynote speech at the Global Design Thinking Conference 2020, Jeanne Liedtka, Professor of Business Administration at the University of Virginia Darden School of Business, talked about using Design Thinking as a way to foster inclusion and dialogue across difference.

It’s not always easy to spot flaws in research papers. Sometimes an error is glaringly obvious - like a vague abstract with no aim and little data - and other times it’s like finding a needle in a stack of pins. . Luckily, the solution isn’t all that prickly. The trick is knowing what to look for during peer review, where to find it and, importantly, how severe the error is.

To help with this, we’ve pulled together a list of six common flaws you can watch out for as a reviewer.

Written by: Kalev Leetaru