It’s 2020 and we need universal design literacy
In 2020, I joined the LUMA Institute — an organization that empowers people to be more visual, imaginative, inquisitive, collaborative, iterative and empathetic through using human-centered design principles.
One of the foundational beliefs of LUMA is working towards achieving universal design literacy. A decade ago, the CEO and co-founder of LUMA, Chris Pacione, wrote an invigorating article on the “case for design literacy” that urges us to re-think some elements of education.
Universal design literacy is the belief that every person should have access to basic design knowledge. Just as we learn math and history in school, we should also learn design principles. Being design literate means having skills in inquiry, ideation, prototyping and evaluation amongst others. This is not suggesting that every person become a Designer with a capital “D” in their future title, but rather that we gain basic competencies of the practice. We learn math, but most people do not go on to be mathematicians. Similarly, design literacy is about exposing everyone to design so that they can be creative problem solvers no matter where their career takes them.
A common misconception is that design is just about making things pretty, but in reality, design is about moving from the current state to a preferred state regardless of the industry or challenge. Design is a way of thinking, and to many, it is synonymous with creative problem-solving. Creativity isn’t something that is inherently inside someone (another misconception); you can foster creativity using design techniques. To cultivate a “designerly way of thinking” (Cross, 1982), you must understand fundamental building blocks of design including the processes, methods, tools, principles, heuristics, and behaviors of the discipline.
Learning design and becoming design literate involves doing design. There are a number of education theories and movements like experiential learning (Kolb, 1984), learning by doing (Dewey, 1986), and project-based learning emerging from situated learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991) that support this notion of learning in practice. As part of achieving universal design literacy, we need to find ways to support learning design through also doing design.
2020 has been an unprecedented year — we have seen a global pandemic uproot traditional corporations, education systems, and ways we interact with humans on a daily basis. This year also shined a spotlight on the systemic injustices embedded into the systems we create as humans.
I think there is an argument now, maybe more than ever, for universal design literacy. If basic design principles and behaviors— like cultivating empathy, challenging the status quo, and collaborating with diverse people—were embedded into us, then we would work towards designing with humility and creating systems that consider all human beings.
Design is good for business, as has been proven by firms like McKinsey and reports from Design Management Institute. But I’d argue that design is good for society. As humans, we create everything in the world around us. This computer I’m typing on was designed. The coffee mug I am drinking from was designed. The process for how the coffee was produced and distributed was designed. This platform, Medium, was designed as a new service of social journalism. The government of your country was designed. Laws were designed. Education systems were designed. When you realize that everything was designed (products, processes, services, systems) across every industry, you can begin to understand why we need to be design literate. If we are designing every day, yet lack the fundamental principles of design like empathy, collaboration and questioning, then we will keep missing the mark on the things we create — continuing to leave people out of the equation. I am a firm believer that if we equip everyone with design competencies that we will get better at designing for the social good of society.
I envision a future where everyone considers themselves part “designer” and that they have the access to design tools to improve the world around them. I believe that if we work to embed design into educational curriculum and/or re-imagine what design education could be that this can become a reality. Imagine that as a child, you learned the principles of design, just like your math, science, reading, and history classes. At LUMA, we use the catchphrase that we are making design accessible from “from pre-k to gray”, which means that regardless of age, you can learn and apply design principles to your work and life.
This is no small challenge. Many organization are working toward universal design literacy in some capacity, whether through trying to change stigmas and stereotypes (i.e. designing/making for girls) or through democratizing design education. I have attempted to highlight a number of these organizations to raise awareness and continue this conversation.
- LUMA Institute — created system for innovation that can be applied to any challenge, platform of resources, and provides design education and training
- Design for America — design for social impact; student-led studios at universities and colleges across the US (44 and growing each year)
- Desklight Learning — using design to transform learning experiences
- Girl Possible — empowering girls to become change-makers through design
- Girl Garage — for girls to fear less and build more
- GoldieBlox — STEM toy company inspiring girls to be makers/engineers
- Project Invent — empowering students to be designers and innovators
- The Teacher’s Guild — transforming teaching through creativity and design
- PBLworks — initiative to embed project-based learning into K-12 education
- IDEO.org — non-profit design studio with free tools to get started
- OpenIDEO — puts the power of human-centered design in the hands of many through real-world challenges and initiatives
- theDesignExchange — open-source innovation and case study archive
- Participate in Design — Singapore based community design studio
- Design Thinking 101 Podcast — learn about design thinking through stories
- Design Innovation Modules — platform with free learning modules on design methods
- MOOCs (massive open online courses), like edX, Coursera, Udacity, Udemy, P2PU, and LinkedIn Learning (previously Lynda), that offer self-paced courses on various design topics
Democratizing design education is essential to making design knowledge accessible and equitable. How might we break-down barriers to accessing design education? How might we reduce misconceptions about what design means? How might we find ways to teach design through doing? How might we achieve universal design literacy?
As Nobel laureate Herbert Simon famously said, “Everyone designs who devises courses of action aimed at changing existing situations into preferred ones.”
In Simon’s eyes, we are all designers. Now, we just have to empower people with the skills to believe they are designers, too.
If you have any thoughts or ideas on achieving universal design literacy or if you know of other organizations or programs working to achieve this goal in any capacity, please leave a comment or send me a message. I’d love to continue to update this post with more resources!
Disclaimer: This post is my own thoughts and opinions, and is not associated with LUMA Institute or any of the other organizations listed throughout.
