Building a Holistic Design Identity Through Integrated Studio Education

Abstract

Design education has quickly evolved from product-to interaction-focused outcomes. As the technical skills needed for success become increasingly unstable, a holistic means of instruction is needed to prepare students for the realities of practice. In this chapter, we describe the creation of a novel undergraduate user experience (UX) design program that focuses on learning strands that weave throughout a studio-based program, Instead of relying upon content-delineated coursework, where strands of competence necessary for practice are often siloed, the integrated studio encourages students to build a flexible design identity, relating multiple strands of content to one another in a systematic way throughout their program.