A difficult question I would like to discuss with you - what do you think are the best design schools today?
What followed Eindhofen and Droog Design in the Netherlands? Is RCA London most advanced? What is the best place to study Design Theory, or Interface Design? Comments welcome!
some thoughts on this
some thoughts on this topic:
What is meant by "best"? and some criteria
If you say “best”, what is meant?
A):
“Best” means the success of the Alumni. To speak with Bill: “It’s the economics, stupid!”
This is not easy to be investigated, because we don’t talk about money and earnings. A school, that is good in that term, must have economical active teachers, middle of age, so they are willing to push their students into business. Business success is very often linked to old-boy networks.
B):
“Best” means the publicized image. Publish ore perish!
This is pretty easy to be investigated. But does that tell anything about the quality of the published works in comparison to “unpublished” schools? Yes, if we think, that Design Journalism is objective and uncommitted. But Design Journalism is part of the system and therefore look at A).
C):
“Best” means the most powerful influence in the movement of the Design Society / Scene. This is only to be said about the past: answers are given by the historiography. The HFG-Ulm has become that famous after (some say because) their closing.
IMHO there is nothing like “best” schools, but there are good and bad schools.
Criteria for a good school:
1. The school has to have a dedicated educational goal. It has to express what the future working environment of the Alumni is.
2. The education has to be evaluated. And yes it is possible to measure (design) education, but only if you have formulated goals, see Nr. 1
3. The school has to be proud to educate design in separation to art (and others): design is not applied arts. This is especially for German schools, where design is often bound to fine arts; what means that design is the black sheep of the family that goes with the bad industrial complex.
4. Design has to be a discipline among others: design practice is an integrated, networked job and so must be the design education.
5. The school has to have a good mixture of teachers with an economical background - tell it oeuvre, or “name” – and of teachers with an academic vita.
6. Teachers have to have a proven educational record; a successful designer is not necessarily a good design teacher. (Take that for serious; the practice in Germany is very often not that way!)
Your question on where to study Design Theory, or Interface Design: both have to be integrated in broader design studies. This broader design study has to be a concrete fundament.
In my opinion, viewing the past, Kassel was a very good design school in the end of the 80ties and the 90ties, just because it was unmodern, not trendy at all. Kassel overslept the “Neues Deutsches Design” etc. for nearly 15 years. So it kept the systematic approach, the methodical way of design and other good stuff that is now again rediscovered. Design was strongly connected to architecture, engineering, social science and art and accepted as an own discipline. Designresearch was practiced even the term was unknown. On the other hand there has been elder design teachers, successful designers by there own, with a reputable oeuvre that could teach good practice. (I don’t say anything about the presence, because I don’t know enough.)
Thanks Gesche for this discussion; hopefully we can achieve an ongoing process on the term “Design Education”. Maybe on the next DGTF-Tagung, we can have a session on that..
A, B, C, D
> A):
> “Best” means the success of the Alumni. To speak with Bill:
> “It’s the economics, stupid!”
> This is not easy to be investigated, because we don’t talk
> about money and earnings. A school, that is good in that
> term, must have economical active teachers, middle of age,
> so they are willing to push their students into business.
for sure its important to talk about money, but good design has imo nothing to do with earning much money.
so A) could make a school more interesting if you think about getting wealthy, but then you should maybe not consider to study design at all? ;)
Another question is, in what kind of field does the school think their students will work. If its cultural and experimental the chance of big money is maybe not as big, as mainstream design.
> Business success is very often linked to old-boy networks.
furthermore its also linked to marketing, acquisition, the place you want to work and customer relations.
> B):
> “Best” means the publicized image. Publish ore perish!
> This is pretty easy to be investigated. But does that tell
> anything about the quality of the published works in
> comparison to “unpublished” schools? Yes, if we think, that
> Design Journalism is objective and uncommitted. But Design
> Journalism is part of the system and therefore look at A).
B.2):
what kind of prizes did the schools students win for their publications and design pieces.
> C):
> “Best” means the most powerful influence in the movement of
> the Design Society / Scene. This is only to be said about
> the past: answers are given by the historiography. The
> HFG-Ulm has become that famous after (some say because)
> their closing.
as I remember right what I have read about Ulm, then the school was already famous before it got closed. For example this school attracted more foreign students then every other German school at this time.
Maybe the influence on the Design Scene has also to do with »famous« Designers that teach at the school. But doesn't mean that they are good teachers at the same time. Some even say that the busy Designers don't have much time for their students.
maybe we could also add
D):
how much study fees do you have to pay and what kind of environment (workshops, print shops, your own table?, opening times of the school) get you back instead. Some German schools are still free, for some you have to up to 500 €, in the Netherlands you pay up to 1600 € (Dutch Students get approximately 1000 € back).
BusinessWeek: The Best Design Schools in the World
http://images.businessweek.com/ss/07/10/1005_dschools/index_01.htm?chan=...
Bernardo van de Schepop
------------
Master candidate - Design for Interaction
Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering
TU Delft, Delft, The Netherlands
BusinessWeek criteria and some own thoughts
This link gives some methodological hints:
http://images.businessweek.com/ss/07/10/1005_dschools/index_01.htm?chan=...
I think it's all about students. They tend to be more motivated/focused in elitist schools. On the other side there is a survival of the fittest in big unniversities. The absolute number of "successful" alumni is probably similar at both kinds of school.
Design theory seems to be without relevance in the BusinessWeek ranking.