Jan Eckert: "Design Education at the Dawn of New Pedagogies" with panel discussion
Channel: The New Art School
Date: 15/11/2021

Jan Eckert - Design Education at the Dawn of New Pedagogies.

There is a lot being written and said about the transformative power of Design in the context of complex problem solving. Initiatives such as the New European Bauhaus commit to design as a discipline that holds the power of identifying, framing and solving clusters of problems such as e.g. the ones summarised in Agenda 2030 by applying strategies of collective project-making

21 with a specific regard to human- and planet-centredness. Yet, Design Education keeps being stuck in an identity crisis that oscillates between the teaching of traditional making skills, a scholarised discourse trying to engage in Critical Theory and the expanding field of teaching design as a mindset or “way of thinking” to address organisational change and challenges in innovation. A holistic approach, which often is promoted as being one of the strengths of the design domain, is clearly lacking in the context of this educational crisis of one of the youngest academic disciplines in Europe. Meanwhile, shorter half-life of knowledge and skills urges today’s learners to leave linear learning paths and engage in networks of lifelong learning. Job profiles are becoming less clear and predictable, which again urges learners to continue their learning biographies on the job where an extended educational landscape is being catered by a rising number of private actors. It becomes more and more clear that education itself has turned into a wicked problem that needs to be addressed. And from a design perspective the question rises whether and how design education is ready to face this dawn of new pedagogies.

Jan Eckert is a Higher Education Manager, Design Educator and Researcher at the Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts at the University of Gothenburg where he currently works as Head of the Design Unit. He holds a PhD in Design Sciences obtained from IUAV University of Venice and an international Master’s Degree in Interior Architectural Design from the University of Applied Sciences in Stuttgart, the Edinburgh College of Art and the University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Lugano. Before, he studied Interior Architecture at the University of Applied Sciences in Stuttgart and at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs in Paris.

Jan first worked as Interior Architect in the field of Retail and Exhibition Design. As a Senior Researcher at Lucerne’s Competence Center for Typology & Planning in Architecture, he then started developing human centred methods and research projects in the field of Workplace Design. Until February 2021, he was Head of the Master’s Programmes in Design, Service Design and Digital Ideation at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts and Senior Strategy Consultant at Mint Architecture in Zürich, Switzerland. He was a co–lecturer in Interior Architecture at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts, a visiting lecturer in Design at IUAV University of Venice, Berne University of the Arts as well as an invited lecturer at Universidad del Este, La Plata, Universidad Blas Pascal, Córdoba, Argentina and Izmir University of Economics, Turkey. From an academic point of view, Jan is particularly interested in the future of higher education as well as leadership strategies for cross-sectoral collaborations between designers and non-designers.

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Please watch: "Design Education Talks Ep. 80 - Tony Pritchard" 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Or1xo5ew0yg
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