Teaching values in design in higher education – towards a new normal

• We can see an uprising trend in various initiatives around the world in order to increase awareness of the role that values play in design. Besides in research and development, we now also see this trend in higher education curricula. Identifying ethical and social dilemmas is currently becoming a part of the explicit learning goals in a growing number of university courses aiming to contribute to sustainable and ethical development. However, there is still a lack of educational resources to support such teaching, and a clear articulation of what characterises progression towards becoming a responsible and ethical designer is largely missing. In response to this, the VASE project was initiated aiming to develop open educational resources made available online targeting teachers in higher education. However, although the main aim of teaching values in design is to educate responsible and ethical designers of tomorrow, one question remains – how do you know when your students have become responsible and ethical designers? To answer that question, we have developed a research-based model for understanding and articulating progression in teaching values in design. We propose this model as a common language for discussing, developing and determining learning goals and educational resources focused on values in design.

Keyword

values in design

assessment

responsible design

ethics

higher education

Interaktionsdesign

Interaktionsdesign

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

kon (subject category)