Systems Thinking in Socially Engaged Design Settings: What Can We Learn?
Chanel Beebe
C. Robert Kenley
Purdue University, Industrial Engineering
Abstract. Socially engaged design programs, community development coalitions, and intentional and unintentional design spaces are rich with expertise and thinkers that are developing solutions to very pressing, yet complicated problems. Little research is conducted on the expertise and sense-making of the community partners present. The goal of this research endeavor is to unpack the ways various community partners make meaning of their design experiences by answering: What evidence of system’s thinking can be seen in the way community partners describe their work or context? A qualitative research study has been conducted in which fifteen community partners have been observed and interviewed at various points of their engagement within socially engaged design programs. Resulting codes and competencies can be used to expand scholarly conceptions of community cultural wealth, social resistance and much more. Further, this research has implications for more novel and genuine ways to situate design learning within systems thinking competencies.