I got a sneaky sneaky peaky today while doing an exam supervision for the year 12 exam for Design today. I thought it was a fantastic exam. The stimulus was basically asking the students, from what I could tell, to design something that deals with the problem of 'obsolete baby gear.' I'm talking prams toys etc. They had a bunch of quotes about sustainability, longevity, recycling, etc. And they had to design something that dealt with that problem. I saw some students, who, from my limited knowledge of design (graphics in my day), developed an idea for products that were multi purpose, or that could be used over and over again, or could be repurposed later on.
But what I found INCREDIBLY interesting, is that many of the students appeared not to be designing a 'product' at all. Instead they were designing bigger concepts. App ideas, recycling bin systems, places that people could come and visit to share their resources, swapping and donating items etc.
What I LOVE about this is that the students are no longer thinking about design as designing products for sale. They are considering systems, people, concepts, bigger ideas, campaigns, marketing, app creation.. the list goes on. This is a big jump from what I did in school. I remember that ALL of our assessments were product designs, or redesigns. Very little of the process was thinking about bigger picture ideas.
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