The new Industrial Design Program and Faculty in Eindhoven : competence-based learning and designed intelligence

In this paper, Kyffin analyses important trends in both technology and society, in order to understand the new demands and challenges facing the design profession. He concludes that, to respond to these challenges, there is a need for a new type of design research and new forms of teaching design. In this context, ‘Designed Intelligence’ and ‘Competence-based learning’ play an important role. Feijs from the Technical University of Eindhoven was co-Author and collaborator. One aspect of the Salone Milan is to consider the current state of Design education around the world. The conference reviewed and reflected upon the different methods and approaches used in different contexts. Design in the UK has always been taught through enabling students to practice and reflect on their output. This is not necessarily the case in other countries. In the Netherlands, for example, there is a slow move away from delivering knowledge to students in the form of lectures and notes, towards a process of experience based learning through problem solving and role-playing, in order to learn how to conceive of, represent, justify and communicate ideas concerning the future of client ambitions. Much of the paper was drawn from an earlier understanding of the differences in how designers and engineers learn to create, reflect on their creativity and apply it to the realm of professional practice. For example Ideas expressed in ‘Design, Engineering and Creativity: What stimulates the Creative process’? Journal of Design and Technology Education, Summer 1998, 113-116). An update to the thinking of Kyffin’s paper is presented through his keynote to EPDE 2007 at Northumbria University, following consultations with Young and Bohemia.