Education guide 'Eindhoven designs' - Technische Universiteit ...

Preface
Since 2001 the Department of Industrial Design at Eindhoven University of Technology has
been facilitating students to become professional designers. Given the department’s focus,
educational approach and organisation, our graduates distinguish themselves from other
designers in various ways. They design intelligent systems, are life-long and self-managing
learners, develop their expertise and identity continuously, and contribute to building
communities at the intersection of design, engineering and science.
The design of our curriculum is rooted in the department’s focus on designing intelligent
systems, products and services for social/societal transformation, a competency-centred
approach to learning, and a network organisation that aims to integrate education and research.
In this book we elucidate the theoretical bases for this foundational trinity and illustrate how
we have implemented them in our curriculum. As such, it offers an explanation of the what, why
and how to our staff members and students. But it may also prove to be a source of inspiration
for external curriculum designers who would like to adopt a similar innovative and integrative
approach or who are merely curious about the ins and outs. Moreover, it might give insight to our
industrial partners: what can they expect and how can they benefit from the department and our
students? What can our new type of designers do for you?
For people who would like to have more detailed and practical information about our curriculum,
we suggest having a look at our intranet: http://w3.id.tue.nl/en/intranet/
Designing, improving, and enabling an innovative curriculum such as ours requires a continuous
and joint effort. We would like to thank all staff members and students for their contributions to
this process. Several of them took the responsibility to shape, for example, competency areas
and Themes as described in this book. Many of them participated in sessions and workshops we
or they organised as part of the implementation process. Their comments, questions and effort
have been input for further improvement, have sharpened our thinking and have inspired us to
write this book.
We are very grateful for what all our students achieve in our programme and for the support
our staff members provide them with. We would like to thank all students whose work is shown
on the photographs in this book. Furthermore, we would like to give special thanks to those
students whose work has been illustrated in this book for wanting to share it with this larger
audience: Bas Groenendaal, Erica Battaglia, Veronica Cornacchini, Youyou Yang, Pak Wing Man,
Jesper Schwachöfer, Sibrecht Bouwstra, John Helmes, Eva Hopma, Floris Kimman, Bram Knaapen,
David Menting, and Emin Sinani.
Caroline Hummels
Director of Education
Diana Vinke
Policy Officer Education