Design For Social Entrepreneurship Syllabus

Design for Social Entrepreneurship Sami Nerenberg

Fall 2008- RISD Industrial Design

A social entrepreneur is someone who recognizes a social problem and uses entrepreneurial principles to organize, create, and manage a venture to make social change. This course aims to cultivate social entrepreneurial designers by investigating the power of design of products, systems and services to create positive social and environmental change. Looking at both international and domestic issues, this course asks, how can design and design thinking be used to solve the world’s leading problems to achieve triple bottom line sustainability-environmentally, socially, and economically? Structured around holistic thinking, collaborative and individual design work, with mentorship from experts in the field, this course uncovers how to design a product or service, wrap a business around it, and create tangible positive impact in our world today. The first half of the semester, the studio will investigate the UN Millennium Development Goals as a framework of understanding global issues. This investigation will include intensive research, peer-to-peer learning, system’s mapping, and a design project. As a group the studio will translate the UN goals to the “US Sustainability Goals” (USSG) - identifying the eight key factors the US must focus on to become socially and environmentally sustainable. We will develop a series of educational videos defining the USSG to share with the larger design community including IDEO, Core77 and others. As a final project each of you as an individual or small group, will choose a USSG and delve into the communities around us, to discover how design can improve the quality of life for our social and environmental landscapes. Throughout the semester you will acquire and utilize the following skills: problem finding, problem solving, critical thinking, information architecture, new media, human factors, marketing, product design, system/service design, working in a group dynamic, presentations, and business strategy. Between guest lecturers, in class workshops, and desk-crits, it is essential you show up to class on time every time and dress professionally to present your work. The projects and deliverables created during this course will be shared with the larger design community including IDEO, Procter & Gamble,Core77 and other design companies. For more information about this course, please contact: [email protected]

Weeks 1-3: Research: Converging International Information Sep 16-18: Assignment 1: UN Millennium Development Goals- Background Research Sep 18-23: Assignment 2: TED Talks-Inspiration Sep 23-25: Assignment 3: International Precedents- Looking at What’s Been Done

Weeks 4-6:Design: International Synthesis and Divergence Sep 25-Oct 2: Project 1: Systems Mapping Due October 2nd Oct 2-21: Project 2: Design for Development Oct 9: pm Presentations from International Organizations (Tentatively) - Design that Matters- Timothy Prestero - Project H - Emily Pilloton - Aid to Artisans - Mimi Robinson Mid-Crit- Oct 14 Final Crit Oct 21:

Weeks 7-9: Design & Research: Bringing it Home & Spreading the Word Oct 21-23: Assignment 4: Domestic Precedents Oct 23-Nov 4: Project 3: US Sustainability Goals Due November 4th Oct 28: pm Multicultural Affairs Workshop Oct 30: pm Presentations from Local Organizations (Tentatively) - Sweat Equity Enterprises - Sustainable South Bronx - Save the Bay - New Urban Arts - Ecolect Nov 4-13: Project 4: UN MDG-USSG Video Due November 13th Nov 4: pm Video Editing and Animation Workshop Nov 8: Better by Design Conference Nov 13: pm Presentations from RISD Community -OMA -OPE -OSL -Res Life -Respond Design -International Affairs -RISD Reach Weeks 9-13: The Ground Floor- Final Project Nov 13-Dec 11: Final Project 5: Design for Local Sustainability Nov 18: pm Business & Career Workshop Mid-Crit-Dec 2 Final Crit: Thursday December 11