Abstract
A base definition of sustainability is balancing environmental, economic and societal concerns with future generations in mind. At its core, sustainability is future-focused, as the education of future design professionals must be. Design is understood to be a discipline seeking to improve the condition of current and future populations. Why then, is sustainability not universally integrated into design education programs and their curricula? This paper will look at a logical framework for instructors to introduce sustainability into design curriculum in a manner that shifts from looking at sustainability competencies, to a more profession-specific vision for sustainable literacy. An argument for the need, approach and opportunity for sustainability literacy, as well as a case study in which this framework was applied to a graphic design studio class will be share.
Keywords
sustainability literacy, design education, problem solving, design pedagogy
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2016.380
Citation
Quam, A. (2016) Integrating Sustainability Literacy into Design Education, in Lloyd, P. and Bohemia, E. (eds.), Future Focused Thinking - DRS International Conference 2016, 27 - 30 June, Brighton, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2016.380
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Integrating Sustainability Literacy into Design Education
A base definition of sustainability is balancing environmental, economic and societal concerns with future generations in mind. At its core, sustainability is future-focused, as the education of future design professionals must be. Design is understood to be a discipline seeking to improve the condition of current and future populations. Why then, is sustainability not universally integrated into design education programs and their curricula? This paper will look at a logical framework for instructors to introduce sustainability into design curriculum in a manner that shifts from looking at sustainability competencies, to a more profession-specific vision for sustainable literacy. An argument for the need, approach and opportunity for sustainability literacy, as well as a case study in which this framework was applied to a graphic design studio class will be share.