05/04: 18S Week 6 – Guest Speakers

Lots of exciting things in class this week as we transitioned back to our more traditional lecture/work session class time model.

To start of the week though, we had Hannah Hoyt, a D’13 and ENGS12 alum currently studying architecture at GSD come speak with the class about her own experiences with human-centered-design in her post-Dartmouth trajectory. Hannah gave a very insightful talk that students thoroughly absorbed as many of them stayed after class to ask questions. It was an absolute pleasure to get to have her come in person.

On Tuesday, we had yet another guest speaker come as Daniella Reichstetter from Tuck visited our class again to talk briefly on implementation practices and tips. Daniella formatted her presentation to become more of a Q&A after a few minutes of lecturing so she could help teams with specific implementation and negotiation techniques — a strategy that was deeply appreciated by several teams who took advantage of this great chance to pick the brains of such an awesome Tuck professor!

We rounded of Thursday with a traditional lecture + work session structure so teams could huddle and prepare for their second midpoint presentations due next Tuesday!

04/27: 18S Week 5 – Co-Working Sessions P2

This week we got the very exciting news that our class will be able to run again next year – so, as you may imagine, we’re thrilled!

In terms of course activities, we continued the co-working sessions work model for this week as they were so effective the prior week. Most of this weeks sessions only required 45min check-ins instead of an hour, so this was a useful learning from iterating. This is a model that we’ll definitely be integrating more continuously next year, especially during the spring term.

We were also delighted to help out at the DCAL ExFest event that happened on Thursday April 26th, where we had a booth and got to share the SDC with guests that popped by!

 

04/20: 18S Week 4 – Co-Working Sessions

In the spirit of prototyping and constantly striving for new, better work models this week we switched things up and instead of having regular class we set up 1 hour meetings with each team during the week. These sessions, which we dubbed co-working sessions were actually a great opportunity for our instructional team to delve into each project in-depth and help the students think through to their logical next steps, etc.

This weeks work was so effective that we’ve decided to repeat it again next week!

 

04/13: 18S Week 3 – Presentations

This week we got a first (awesome) insight into what teams have been up to so far with the first midpoint presentations of the term. Isn’t it crazy to think 1/3 of the term is already over?! Teams presented everything from potential final ideas to walkthroughs of existing prototypes/mockups to even new primary and secondary research they’ve been uncovering. Due to how vastly different each presentation was, we gave students certain leeway in helping them determine what aspects of their own presentations should be the focus of evaluation.

In addition, we had the fantastic surprise of having one of the original ENGS12 SDC creators, Brendan Barth, come visit and help evaluate the presentations!

 

04/06: 18S Week 2 – Individual Check In’s

As students get back into the rhythm of project work, we decided to dedicate time this week to checking in with students from the class at an individual basis in order to assess what individual satisfaction and concerns were. These meetings have been a great opportunity to better understand the motivations and pain points of all students in the class, and get to know everyone a little better. We’ll be continuing them through next week as well!

 

 

03/31: 18S Week 1 – Is March over already?!

Can you believe march is over already? We definitely can’t!

Because design thinking is all about prototyping and being open to new ideas – we’re starting this term with a new team being created in the class, and our enrollment count going up to 21, as a new duo is formed to tackle an Open Ideo challenge related to recycling of Nike waste materials (https://www.openideo.com/challenge-briefs/nike-design-with-grind). We also started this term with Ashley’s birthday! Which of course meant, lots of delicious after class snacks and time for everybody to hang!

As each team takes a very individualized track this term, Tuesday was mostly spent checking in to see where everybody’s at, and also explain expectations and deadlines for the term — we’re letting loose and focusing around deadline dates rather than content this term. Yup, that means we’re letting every team tell us what they should be presenting at each deliverable date based around where they expect to be at the end of the term, and what their solution will likely be looking like. We expect that although teams are currently starting at different places: some going back to the ideation phase whilst others have already chosen what prototype to refine, we expect all teams to begin focusing their efforts solely on their final product by the end of April, so they get a full month of prototyping, testing, and iterating at the end — and hopefully, a product/service/experience that can exist on its own in the real world!

To get everybody comfortable and back in “team mode” we had a few ice breaker activities on Tuesday and then dedicated a significant part of Thursday introducing teamwork frameworks by talking about the “forming, storming, norming, performing” process and discussing DISC assessments. DISC assessments are a personality test that is particularly interesting for this context as it also takes into account how people work in team environments. Due to our budget we worked on the free version for this year, but considering its worth and relative success, its something we are eager to include and pay for if we get the program running next year. DISC assessments are a useful activity not just in the team environment, but also as a way for individuals to better reflect about their own communication and work styles.

02/09: 18W Week 10 – The End of P.1!

Our final presentations were held on Tuesday March 6th at Occom Commons, and they were great! We invited a variety of guests, including project partners, Dartmouth staff, and Dartmouth alums, and our students all gave great deliveries that showcased all their hard work.

After presentations we invited students for a debrief lunch, where we had students reflect on their experience this term, and what they’d like to see more of in the spring.

We part for a much needed break but excited to continue working this spring!

03/02: 18W Week 9 – Time to Clean Up

How is it week 9 already? How are we done already? This week was all about making sure our student teams were getting to that last place they needed to for their final presentations. Their homework over the weekend had been to actually test their prototypes, so most of Tuesday was about having student teams talk about their prototyping experience and work on their presentations.

Adding to this, on Wednesday we had our Tuck coaches come help us again – this time to speak a lot about presentation tips and help students do quick dry runs of their presentations.

And then, it was Thursday – and student projects were ready for in-class presentations! In preparation for the “public” presentation next Tuesday, all of Thursday was presentation rehearsals and a lot of feedback-giving. Although there were a few tweaks and needed improvements, we are so incredibly excited and proud for you to see their final output!

02/23: 18W Week 8 – Ideas, ideas, ideas

As students prepare for their final presentations – in which they have to show some sort of rough idea prototype – this week was dedicated to groups presenting the ideas they are contemplating following, and having a lot of time for in-class feedback around these ideas.

Whereas both Tuesday and Thursday were dedicated to idea presentations and feedback, on Wednesday we had our second wonderful guest alumni speaker for the term, Sara Gabriele ’16, who currently works as a user researcher at Google. As she told students her own pathway she gave us all some great insights and advice – such as the power of crafting narratives when explaining your college trajectory in job interviews.

02/16: 18W Week 7 – Getting Down to Business with Tuckies

Our week started with a wonderful guest lecture from Professor Lorie Loeb, in which she introduced UX/UI to students and shared some of her own “rules for good design.” The students were engaged and we were delighted to have her in class!

Wednesday’s x-hour was the beginning of a new (kind of last minute) but surprisingly successful initiative, in which we brought Tuck students as individual coaches for each team. This effort was organized thanks to the amazing Daniella Reichstetter, and it was a fantastic experience! Each Tuck student got matched to one project, and both graduate and undergraduate students stayed engaged through the full x-hour period. Definitely something we’ll be doing again and organizing more next year!

Finally, on Thursday we primarily had a work session for students to prep for their ideas presentation the following week – not without first giving them a brief “presentation tips” lecture with some of Eugenes top aesthetic design suggestions.

 

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