Whitman Today: Sharon and Justin go to School

Sometimes it’s not just the students who get to have transformative experiences. This June, Sharon Alker (Professor of English) and Justin Lincoln (Professor of Art) attended a week-long workshop at the Stanford d-school, where the goal is to help participants—students or faculty—use design to make change where(ever) they are. Alker and Lincoln went to the d-school as part of their work with a group of faculty and staff designing a new concentration in human-centered design (HCD). What they learned there has been shaping some of the group’s conversations about curricular design. We asked them about their experience and what they acquired that might be of value to the Whitman Community.

What did you expect going in?

Sharon: “When I went there originally, I wanted to get some strategies immediately on how to use design techniques in activities and assignments for a spring course I'm teaching on literature and wicked problems. I acquired ample strategies and techniques which I hope we can share with faculty, but also much more.”

Justin: “I originally signed up with a certain ambivalence. I was really curious but also kind of expected that it was just going to be like a capitalist business cult. In the end my reservations were very small-minded and I’m very grateful that I had a chance to go.”

What did you take away from the experience?

Alker: “They taught me a kind of disruptive thinking. The systems that are around you, whether you are in an airport, a college, or a park, suddenly become more visible, which is really kind of neat, because then you feel you can intervene at leverage points and actually make changes. The d-school also approaches collaborative creativity and thinking in diverse ways; how something as simple as changing the space can change the way you approach your work.

Justin Lincoln’s experience was more deeply personal. “The workshop challenged many of my own paradigms and thought processes. I started thinking….What damaging things have we internalized as a culture, an institution, family, or as individuals? What happens when one throws them out? What if fear was one of the things we threw out? Or shame or guilt? I returned from the workshop basically a 1000X happier, more outward facing, person. It's literally like a switch was flipped. Whatever it is that has possessed me, I’d rather it be in the driver’s seat for the rest of my life.”

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Participants in workshops at the d-school came away with a rich and specific pedagogical tool kit for their own courses. Alker noted learning about the process of group collaboration, including “what shut people down or where they felt empowered.” Jason Pribilsky, Professor of Anthropology, who attended in 2018, expressed that the “experience was intense, and you’re thinking and doing design work the entire time. It’s a little cultish, to be sure, but you are given so many approaches to explore and build from, it’s your voice to make it what you will. I’ve used a bunch of design-thinking techniques in various classes since.”

Learning new pedagogical tools is a desired outcome of d-school workshops, but the most fundamental goal is to shift our perceptions, not only of the designed world that surrounds us but also of the human relationships that make collaboration possible. As Lincoln reflected, “It’s about empowerment and the flow of human energy. As soon as someone gives you this kind of power, you want to redistribute it, you want to share it. I was asked recently what design is, and at this point I’d say that it is about the shaping and coevolution of change. What that means for me is that design isn’t just about you, or me, or some ‘them’ that is known or imagined. It’s about ‘us’ on as collective a level as we can make.”

The d-school participants and those working on the concentration in human-centered design plan to share specifics about the program with the faculty as a whole this fall.