[[ STAGING Anon]] | MARCH 26, 2020: DESIGNING OUR SHARED FUTURES: CONNECTING STUDENTS TO THE COMMUNITY | Global Innovation and Design Lab

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On a sunny Friday afternoon, over forty students and community leaders from the South Sound gathered for a workshop in William Philip Hall focused on the central question,

“How might we collaborate to prepare students for the workforce and build a thriving community for all?”

What better way to tackle this issue than with a collaborative, hands-on, and creative design thinking workshop. Institute for Global Engagement (IGE) Executive Director, Dr. Divya McMillin and Vice President, HTC Creative Labs, Drew Bamford, led the group through four activities to ideate prototypes and generate solutions that could be implemented in the future. The Global Innovation and Design (GID) Lab team including student assistants, Chris Sim, Lan Allison, and Abdul Abubakar, and Program Administrator, Krissy Kimura, assisted as facilitators for the workshop.

Ice Breaker

To begin to narrow down the overarching How Might We question at hand, the group participated in an ice breaker called the 5 Whys, an iterative interrogative technique used to explore the cause-and-effect relationships underlying a particular challenge. Participants were asked to partner up to uncover true need starting with the How Might We question, then taking turns and asking each other “Why?” five time to get to the root of a single problem they could then prototype.

Crafting Physical Prototypes

Lastly, each participant prototyped one of their solutions using the materials on the table (clay, markers, pipe cleaners, tape etc.). The event wrapped up with time to report out and share! Here are some of the highlights:

App
1. For alumni network with different areas of industry and with the ability to chat with a potential mentor
2. To connect students with existing internships with the ability to sort the field, company, term, and qualifications; apply directly in app
A non-profit that provides training, skills, relationship building so that:
1. Students have a place to do homework, continue learning opportunities, be mentored by local artists
2. Students can pick up skills they need: basic networking; tips on body language, attire, mannerisms, manners; how to create a resume, and portfolio
Connect companies with relevant departments or majors so that teachers can integrate business and community partners into curriculum
1. Students take class for quarter where internship is not separate from the classroom
2. Alternatively, students find and work in an internship for the following quarter
Create a class on how to fail and be resilient

Wrap-up

The Shared Futures event was a great success for collaboration, networking, and ideation. All ideas and prototypes will be built into the next level of the Institute for Global Engagement’s Student Engagement Program. The Program serves all UW Tacoma students and the Global Innovation and Design Lab will play an important part in moving these prototypes to reality. Design thinking is a fantastic way to take real-world issues and turn them into concrete, tangible solutions!