1 CONNECTED 2010 – 2ND INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON DESIGN EDUCATION 28 JUNE - 1 JULY 2010, UNIVERSITY OF NEW SOUTH WALES, SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA The University Community as a Design “Client” Mariano Ramirez Jr University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia KEYWORDS: SUSTAINABLE BEHAVIORS, PRODUCT SERVICE SYSTEMS, ENABLING SOLUTIONS, DESIGN COLLABORATION ABSTRACT This paper presents the results of an industrial design studio project that partnered third year students with childcare centers and residential colleges at the Kensington campus of the University of New South Wales. The parties worked within a de-facto “designer-client” collaborative relationship, with the goal being to identify and design-out inefficient and unsustainable practices in water and energy usage and solid waste generation, thereby fostering sustainable living. To provide the theoretical background, MacKenzie-Mohr’s model for fostering sustainable behaviors and community- based social marketing was employed. Students presented design concepts to their “clients”, including staff and student residents, who provided constructive criticism on the ideas and which formed the basis for further design development. The final designs were exhibited in a public exhibition on campus to which the clients, staff and students, were invited. Reflection journals and course evaluations from students show that they genuinely appreciated working with “real” clients with real needs compared to hypothetical studio briefs, but were somewhat disappointed that the clients are not actual manufacturers (“customers”) but rather are “consumers”. INTRODUCTION The University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Australia is one of 413 signatory institutions to the Talloires Declaration, who have committed to incorporate sustainability literacy in teaching, research, operations and outreach. Two of the action plans in this international declaration were to “educate for environmentally responsible citizenship” and to “practice institutional ecology”. By these points signatories undertake to ensure that all their university graduates have the awareness and understanding to be ecologically responsible citizens and commit to establish institutional policies on resource conservation, recycling, waste reduction, and environmentally sound operations (ULSF, 1990). In its strategic vision, UNSW affirms that sustainability is one of its eight values (UNSW, 2007) and reiterates its belief that that “the principles of environmental sustainability should underpin and genuinely apply to all activities in which we are involved” (UNSW, 2005b). STUDIO-COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIP The core third year undergraduate course IDES3221 Industrial Design Studio 3A offered by the UNSW Faculty of the Built Environment is one of many learning platforms in this university that align with the institutional values on sustainability. Moreover, by focusing on design advocating environmental ethics and societal responsibility in “real world” contexts, the IDES3221 syllabus commemorates the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development, which is a challenge for educators to rethink and reform education to become a vehicle of knowledge, thought patterns and values for building a sustainable world (UN, 2002). IDES3221 aims to engage students into employing sustainable innovation approaches as a strategic methodology for their solution generation and development, as well as introduce them to their future responsibility in creating less environmentally damaging solutions and lifestyles. The course runs for 12 weeks 1 with 2 major projects. One of the missions of IDES3221 is to propose creative solutions that would encourage communities to foster more positive behaviors, both environmentally and socially. This approach was inspired by the “enabling sustainable solutions” methodology proposed by Manzini (2002), in which an integrated system of products, services and infrastructures is used to empower individuals and communities to achieve results and solve problems using their own skills and abilities, in a sustainable way. Another inspiration was the growing body of research on designing product service systems (PSS), which is an innovative business model that offers a mix of tangible products and intangible services to jointly fulfill specific customer needs at a reduced environmental impact (UNEP, 2002). In 2006 these enabling solutions and PSS approaches were tested in IDES3221 via a 4-week group project where students targeted segments of the community that could benefit from PSS solutions. The brief emphasized that the sustainable action should not be done automatically by the designed solutions; rather, the user should be actively engaged and involved in performing the task that would achieve sustainability benefits, aided by the new PSS. 1 IDES3221 ran as a 14-week course until 2007, and had 3 major projects.