design education
Jessica Helfland at Design Observer releases
Part 2 of some posts titled "
Annals of Academia," her reflections on design education. It doesn't take a whole lot of imagination to transpose some of her comments to other fields or other
techne:
In general, we introduce theory in the classroom not because of the product it generates so much as the process it informs; but in the absence of an original idea, students often see theory as a validating conceptual armature, a crutch. This is where our educational system fails us: for as long as the connection bewteen theory and practice remains thwarted by poor pedagogical direction, we cannot expect our students to know the difference.
To me, the goal is to groom students whose comfort level with theory is such that they emerge from a degree-granting program able to articulate their own theories.
Helfland's reflections are worthwhile in and of themselves, but I particularly enjoyed reading the comments section from the first installment, and expect that, given a day or two, Part 2 will be equally provocative.
(btw, I happened upon
DO originally through
datacloud, and heartily recommend it to anyone even remotely interested in visual rhetoric. Smart discussions of design theory and practice by some seriously top-flight folk...)
Posted by at May 20, 2004 01:41 PM
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