Di versity and uni ty: Proceedings of IASDR2011, the 4th World Conference on Design Research, 31 October - 4 November, Delft, the Netherlands. Edited by N.F.M. Roozenburg, L.L. Chen & P.J. Stappers. /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// EDUCATING A NEW GENERATION OF INNOVATORS THROUGH AN INTERDISCIPLINARY DESIGN PROGRAM IN CHINA A CASE STUDY ON THE INFORMATION ART AND DESIGN INTERDISCIPLINARY PROGRAM AT TSINGHUA UNIVERSITY Zhiyong Fu / Shuyang Zheng Tsinghua University fuzhiyong@tsinghua.edu.cn / zhengsy@tsinghua.edu.cn ABSTRACT The thoughts and practices for educating the new generation of Chinese designers to meet sustained growth and inclusive development in China is the focus of this paper. Three institutes at Tsinghua University in China co-established the interdisciplinary master’s program, Information Art and Design, in 2009. We created a new research framework for this program to identify the opportunities of social and business innovation, integrate the methodologies based on design thinking, and frame the multi-entrance educational model. The exploration, thoughts and lessons on team building, project management, knowledge construction and integrated innovation will hopefully be a good reference for building similar programs. Keywords: Design education, interdisciplinary program, integrated innovation. INTRODUCTION Facing the increasingly complicated development of society, economy and technology, the crossover and integration of disciplines is becoming the new trend for the development of high-level education. In 2002, the Report Converging Technologies for Improving Human Performance, formulated jointly by the US National Science Foundation and the US Department of Commerce, holds the viewpoint that “The sciences have reached a watershed at which they must unify if they are to continue to advance rapidly.” These days, many famous universities, e.g., Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University, have established interdisciplinary research centers. The training of interdisciplinary talents has become the standard mode for educational innovation. In 1998, the Departments of Fine Arts, Modern Culture, Social Engineering, Structural Engineering and Electronic & Information of Tsukuba University in Japan jointly created a special study program, “Modeling the Evaluation Structure of Kansei”. With the support of interdisciplinary strength, the Program was housed in a separate building for joint research. Research teams were composed of staff from each interdisciplinary profession and integrated fine arts, Kansei engineering and cyber robot, building a unique interdisciplinary design and research field. Carnegie Mellon University in the US offers many interdisciplinary courses in its School of Design and has established different graduate programs that cross over schools and departments. For instance, Communication Planning and Information Design is a program offered with the collaboration of the Department of English, while Product Development is offered with the Mechanical Engineering Department and the Business School. Similarly, Tsukuba University develops interdisciplinary teaching and graduate training among multiple disciplines and supports joint interdisciplinary research. The design and innovation that emerge from many current significant projects indicate that interdisciplinary talents are more capable of integrating and innovating and that an interdisciplinary team is more useful in producing creative outcomes. For instance, many technology- oriented IT corporations, in the phases of product R&D, design and testing, have introduced