Design. Education. Minnesota. To these three I remain true.

Lately I've been having many discussions about the state of design and (design) education in Minnesota. I'm finding myself in endless meetings (HELP!) where our discussions circle around the changes happening or needing to happen in these worlds, respectively. In academia, they're trying to define design, and its many spin-offs: design thinking, social impact design, user experience design, experience design, interactive/-tion design, service design, etc. In industry, they're working to keep up with the demands and reframe their services to fulfill these needs, so as to keep their clients happy and themselves in business. And me? I just want to do. I want to teach our students skills that are endlessly applicable, in an increasingly medium-agnostic world. I want to create experiences that are sustainable, usable, and enjoyable. And I want to be a loving wife, supportive mom, and engaging friend while I do it.

Couple this with wanting to feel like I'm making progress on something (not some idea of a thing), and you get this long-overdue website. I've made it live—even tweeting it!—to be sure I'm held accountable to making timely progress. There's a lot going on in design and education in Minnesota, and I want to be in the middle of it. I just don't want to be stuck.