Don Norman is a global figurehead in the field of design. As an advocate for interdisciplinarity, the founder of User Experience (UX) design, and author of Design for a Better World, he is widely recognised for re-shaping design and advocating for human- and humanity-centred design approaches. The award won by the DSI programme recognises them for playing a “pivotal role in cultivating a new generation of leaders poised to positively impact our global community”.
Those teaching in the DSI major include Tanya Ruka (Ngāti Pakau, Te Uriororoi, Te Parawhau, Te Mahurehure, Ngāphui, Waitaha-Hokianga), Nan O’Sullivan, David Hakaraia (Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Pāoa), Dr Rosie Scott, Tonya Sweet, Dr Gillian McCarthy, and Jessica Whiley. The team have been guided by its Māori colleagues, past and present, who include David and Tanya, as well as Bobby Luke (Ngāti Ruanui), and attribute their guidance as a critical component of its integrity and success.
Humanity-Centred Design (HCD+) expands from human-centred design and acknowledges that design is interconnected with the environment it’s made in. The DSI major has been acknowledged for its integration of Te Ao Māori and mātauranga Māori into the HCD+ methodology and for developing an empowering and educational approach to design in a unique and inspiring humanity-centred way.
The citation from the DNDA says, “Our judges were extremely impressed with this programme. The DSI program at Victoria University of Wellington represents an exceptional model of humanity-centred design education, uniquely grounded in mātauranga Māori and demonstrates impressive scale and impact.”
DSI staff ask students to “design from where they stand” and consider their immediate ecosystems and environments, before trying to address global issues, explains Tanya. “We encourage students to start with questions, not answers. To sit with uncertainty, to be comfortable in the unknown, because it’s in those spaces that the new ways of seeing and creating can emerge.”
The DSI major is taught within the Bachelor of Design Innovation and can also be studied as a major in the Bachelor of Global Studies or the Bachelor of Environment and Society. This enables students from across Te Herenga Waka to harness their creativity and explore social design in their academic journey.
Tanya says, “Students are often surprised and excited by their own potential, and by what design for social innovation and HDC+ offer them as a way of approaching globally wicked problems. By grounding themselves locally first, they uncover knowledge, relationships, and insights that give strength to solutions they can then take further.”
One alum who has proven the positive impact of the programme is KA McKercher, author of Beyond Sticky Notes, who has worked across Australasia. They now work with Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, and also teach design and co-design, and help communities and organisations use their creative powers to undertake co-design. Their work touches the fields of public health, community health, and social care.
Another is Dr Pip Bennett, who works in the Starting Well Commissioning team as part of Health New Zealand. Pip specialises in youth development and utilises her design and research skills to support effective health services in the community.
The DSI major at Te Herenga Waka offers graduates unique skills that support their capacity to be leaders in their field. It encourages graduates to go into the social and work environment as they would into nature, and start to look at challenges, opportunities, and ways in which to connect, to grow themselves, to understand how to support their environments, and lift others’ ability to interact, experience and impact the social, political, and cultural environments they inhabit.
The centring of Te Ao Māori within social and sustainable design education and research has brought the programme international attention, with postgraduates deliberately seeking out this programme within Te Herenga Waka to incorporate diverse approaches and worldviews as a part of their creative practice and activation of positive change.
The 2024 recipients included The Royal College of Art (London UK) and Stanford University (Palo Alto, United States), and the Te Herenga Waka team are delighted to be recognised in such esteemed company. The Don Norman Design Award brings both global recognition and promotion of the School of Design Innovation.