DSI 415 - Multidisciplinary Design for Social Impact

 

 

What You'll Be Doing In This Course

 

In Multidisciplinary Design for Social Impact, you’ll join forces with students from across disciplines (arts, business, engineering, humanities, sciences, and more) to tackle real-world challenges. Student teams work directly with a client from industry, a non-profit or a research professor and will:

  • Define complex social or environmental problems and uncover the needs behind them.
  • Explore cultural, economic, sustainability, and historical factors that shape solutions.
  • Generate and evaluate multiple ideas before selecting the best approach.
  • Build and test prototypes, models, or other tangible realizations of your solution.
  • Present your work in professional design reviews and a final showcase.

This is a fast-paced, collaborative, project-based course where ideas move from concept to tested solution in just one term

 

Skills You'll Develop

 

By the end of the course, you'll have practice with:

  • Research & Analysis: Gathering and synthesizing information from multiple sources to guide design decisions.
  • Collaboration: Working effectively in diverse, multidisciplinary teams and with a real-world client.
  • Solution Design: Creating holistic solutions that balance user needs, sustainability, marketability, and aesthetics.
  • Testing & Evaluation: Developing and applying methods to measure the success of your designs.
  • Professional Communication: Producing compelling written, visual, and oral presentations for various audiences.
  • Apply Scrum (a form of Agile) to hone project management skill

These skills translate directly to careers in industry, nonprofits, entrepreneurship, and research.

 

Robot on a desk

 

 

 

 

 

Report Out

Inaugural Offering of DSI 415