Research-driven education

Our mission statement places research and education at the core of our department: 

Research on and Education in the Design of Systems with Emerging Technologies in a Societal Context  

The education in our department has always been intertwined with the research of the department based on mutual inspiration, academic staff-student collaboration within the industrial design communities and the future forward attitude of the department. Educating the designers for the future requires essential connections between research and education. In the past these connections were often more informal, but recently we are shifting from research-inspired education towards a more structured research-driven education. 

The research in the department focuses on two thematic clusters: Future Everyday and Systemic Change. 

Future Everyday aims at bridging the gap between emerging technologies and people’s everyday life: how to deal with uncertainties that come naturally with new and still evolving technologies, and how to translate them into meaningful products, systems and services that seamlessly blend into everyday life.  

Systemic Change uses Design and Technology to study socio-technical systems at the level of a community, by designing technology-enabled interventions addressing societal challenges and analysing their effect on the eco-system.